Carbamazepine treatment recovered low N-acetylaspartate+N-acetylaspartylglutamate (tNAA) levels in the megencephaly mouse BALB/cByJ-Kv1.1mceph/mceph

• Main Authors: Eric Westman, Christian Spenger, Lars-Olof Wahlund, Catharina Lavebratt
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 2007-04-01
• Series: Neurobiology of Disease
• Subjects: MRS; LCModel; PLS-DA; Epilepsy; mceph/mceph; Carbamazepine
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0969996106003263

Megencephaly mice (BALB/cByJ-Kv1.1mceph/mceph) display excessive brain growth and seizures related to a mutation within the potassium channel gene Kv1.1 producing a malfunctioning protein. 1H Magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) provides means to study brain transmitters and metabolites in vivo. We applied MRS to pinpoint differences in hippocampus between mceph/mceph and wild type (wt) mice. Carbamazepine (CBZ) protects against brain overgrowth in mceph/mceph. Therefore, the effects of durable oral CBZ treatment on the MR spectra were investigated. LCModel was used for spectra quantification and multivariate data analysis applied to detect group differences. mceph/mceph mice had lower levels of N-acetylaspartate+N-acetylaspartylglutamate (tNAA) and choline-containing (tCho) compounds compared to wt mice. Glutamate, glutamine, taurine and myo-inositol levels were similar in wt and mceph/mceph. Furthermore, CBZ treatment recovered tCho and tNAA levels in mceph/mceph. Thus, distinct differences in MRS spectra between mceph/mceph and wt mice were depicted and treatment effects of CBZ were monitored using MRS.