Research Information System
Online Türk Sağlık Bilimleri Dergisi, vol.6, no.4, pp.535-541, 2021 (Peer-Reviewed Journal)
Objective: The antidepressant agomelatine agent is a melatonin receptor (MT1 and MT2) agonist and a serotonin receptor (5-HT2C) antagonist. Increasing evidence shows that agomelatine has neuroprotective and neuromodulatory effects. In this study, the potential effects of agomelatine in rats with scopolamine-induced cognitive impairment were investigated. Materials and Methods: Adult male rats were administered scopolamine (1 mg/kg) and agomelatine (40 mg/kg) for 21 days. After drug administration, rats were subjected to new object recognition (NOR) and Morris water maze (MWM) tests in order to evaluate cognitive behaviors. In addition, brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and acetylcholine (ACh) levels in the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex were evaluated. Results: Scopolamine significantly decreased both spatial memory and discrimination index (p<0.05). Agomelatine treatment increased spatial memory performance and exploration time, but did not affect the discrimination index (P>0.05). In addition, agomelatine significantly increased BDNF levels in both hippocampus and prefrontal cortex compared to the scopolamine group (p<0.05, p<0.01, respectively). On the other hand, there was no statistically significant difference between the ACh levels of the groups (p>0.05). Conclusion: Taken together, these results demonstrated that agomelatine plays a important role in alleviating scopolamine-induced memory impairment. Therefore, we suggest that agomelatine may be a potential agent in the prevention of cognitive impairment.