Agonism Of Transient Receptor Potential Vanilloid Member 1 Induces A Protective Heat Shock Response In The Brain

Background: There is a lack of widely applicable treatments of stroke. One of the potential new treatment strategies is the induction of heat shock proteins (HSPs), such as Hsp27 and Hsp70, in the brain, which was shown to confer neuroprotection from ischemia. In epithelial cells, HSPs were shown to be induced by agonists of the Transient Receptor Potential Vanilloid Member 1 ion channel (TRPV1), also known as the heat and capsaicin receptor. Therefore, our overall hypothesis is that systemic administration of TRPV1 agonist dihydrocapsaicin (DHC) induces HSPs in the brain cortical neurons and thus provides neuroprotection from stroke. In the present study we focus on the initial portion of the hypothesis, that TRPV1 agonism promotes HSP induction in the brain. Methods: We determined relative expression of candidate HSP genes by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction after DHC treatment in cultured rat primary cortical neurons as well as in cortex tissue samples of in vivo DHC-treated wild-type a...