Figure 2.

PGSF inhibits glutamate-induced apoptosis in cultured hippocampal neurons.

Cultured neurons were treated for 24 hours with glutamate (100 µM) alone or in the presence of PGSF (10 µM) or MK801 (10 µM), and neuronal apoptosis was detected using cleaved caspase-3 staining. (A) Representative images of neurons under control conditions and after treatment with glutamate, glutamate + PGSF, or glutamate + MK801. There were many more cleaved caspase-3-positive neurons in the glutamate-only group than in the other groups. Neurons displaying signs of apoptosis are indicated by arrows. Scale bar: 20 µm. (B) Quantitative analysis of the neuronal apoptosis ratio under control conditions and after treatment with glutamate, glutamate + PGSF, or glutamate + MK801. Data are shown as the mean ± SEM. The experiment was repeated four times. ***P < 0.001 (one-way analysis of variance followed by Dunnett’s post hoc test). Original data for Figure 2 are shown in Additional file 3. Ctrl: Control; Glu: glutamate; MK801: (5S,10R)-(+)-5-methyl-10,11-dihydro-5H-dibenzo[a,d]cyclohepten-5,10-imine hydrogen maleate, an N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor antagonist; PGSF: polygalasaponin F.