Hypoxic-ischemic brain injury to fetuses results in stillbirths, neonatal death, cerebral palsy, mental retardation or learning disabilities. Hypoxia-ischemia in the fetus results in one of the highest indexes of burden of disease, if one considers mortality, lost years of life, loss of years of healthy life or the lifetime burden of caretakers. The long-term goal of our research group is to understand the mechanisms of brain injury and develop interventions that will ameliorate hypoxia-ischemic fetal brain injury. We have developed a clinically relevant model of acute placental insufficiency that results in a cerebral palsy phenotype in the newborn animals. Magnetic resonance imaging during the acute insult and the early reperfusion period predicts which animals will develop the cerebral palsy phenotype. This timing implicates oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction as candidates for deciding cellular fate. One of the primary enzymes that removes superoxide one of the major sources of oxidative stress, is manganese superoxide dismutase which is found in the mitochondria The hypothesis is the level of mitochondrial dysfunction and superoxide accumulation are the initiators of brain cell injury. The level of manganese superoxide dismutase is crucial to for the ability of the mitochondrion to remove the superoxide before is causes damage. This proposal uses the predictive value of MRI and our animal model of cerebral palsy to look at mitochondrial dysfunction and superoxide at 30 minutes, 2 hours and 6 hours of reperfusion. It utilizes a unique approach to look directly at the brain cells in vitro after the insult before repair or ongoing injury cascades occur. It uses the unique tools of flow cytometry and cell sorting combined with molecular biology techniques. It will test antioxidant therapies in the clinical relevant animal model and if these are successful could lead to treatments that could decrease brain injury to newborn babies and decrease cerebral palsy, mental retardation or learning disabilities. Public Health Relevance: Lack of oxygen to the brain either before or just after a baby is born can result in severe brain damage or death of the baby. If the child survives one of the results can be cerebral palsy. This proposal aims to understand how lack of oxygen causes brain damage and will test potential treatments that could decrease the severity of brain damage and prevent the child from developing cerebral palsy. ? ? ?

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health & Human Development (NICHD)
Type
Clinical Investigator Award (CIA) (K08)
Project #
1K08HD057307-01A1
Application #
7530496
Study Section
Pediatrics Subcommittee (CHHD)
Program Officer
Vitkovic, Ljubisa
Project Start
2008-09-06
Project End
2013-08-31
Budget Start
2008-09-06
Budget End
2009-08-31
Support Year
1
Fiscal Year
2008
Total Cost
$108,000
Indirect Cost
Name
Northshore University Healthsystem
Department
Type
DUNS #
069490621
City
Evanston
State
IL
Country
United States
Zip Code
60201
Drobyshevsky, Alexander; Cotten, C Michael; Shi, Zhongjie et al. (2015) Human Umbilical Cord Blood Cells Ameliorate Motor Deficits in Rabbits in a Cerebral Palsy Model. Dev Neurosci 37:349-62
Drobyshevsky, Alexander; Jiang, Rugang; Derrick, Matthew et al. (2014) Functional correlates of central white matter maturation in perinatal period in rabbits. Exp Neurol 261:76-86
Drobyshevsky, Alexander; Jiang, Rugang; Lin, Laixiang et al. (2014) Unmyelinated axon loss with postnatal hypertonia after fetal hypoxia. Ann Neurol 75:533-41
Yu, Lei; Vásquez-Vivar, Jeannette; Jiang, Rugang et al. (2014) Developmental susceptibility of neurons to transient tetrahydrobiopterin insufficiency and antenatal hypoxia-ischemia in fetal rabbits. Free Radic Biol Med 67:426-36
Derrick, Matthew; Englof, Ila; Drobyshevsky, Alexander et al. (2012) Intrauterine fetal demise can be remote from the inciting insult in an animal model of hypoxia-ischemia. Pediatr Res 72:154-60
Drobyshevsky, Alexander; Luo, Kehuan; Derrick, Matthew et al. (2012) Motor deficits are triggered by reperfusion-reoxygenation injury as diagnosed by MRI and by a mechanism involving oxidants. J Neurosci 32:5500-9
Derrick, Matthew; Drobyshevsky, Alexander; Ji, Xinhai et al. (2009) Hypoxia-ischemia causes persistent movement deficits in a perinatal rabbit model of cerebral palsy: assessed by a new swim test. Int J Dev Neurosci 27:549-57