Objective: To investigate the protective effects of tanshinone on ischemia-like injury models.
Method: Six ischemia models including hypoxia, hypoglucose, oxidant injury, calcium overload, nitric oxide neurotoxicity and glutamic acid injury were used to assay the anti-ischemic roles of tanshinone in cultured PC12 cells, by using morphological examination, MTT staining and LDH measurement.
Result: It was found that 3. 125-200 microliters.ml-1 tanshinone possessed obvious protective effects on PC12 cells from six ischemia-like injury models. Tanshinone could increase the number of life cells and decrease LDH activity significantly, particularly in hypoxia and caffeine injured model.
Conclusion: Tanshinone protected PC12 cells from all injury models effectively in vitro. Its action may mainly focus on inhibiting development of the primary period of ischemia injury and calcium overloading injury.