Chronic intracerebroventricular administration of dimethyl sulfoxide attenuates streptozotocin-iduced memory loss in rats

Background and aim: the memory impairment, obtained fromintracerebroventricular (i.c.v.) infusion of streptozotocin in rats through activationof oxidative stress, is accepted as sporadic alzheimer’s disease model in mostexperimental studies. dimethyl sulfoxide (dmso) as a solvent is widely used inanimal studies to have antioxidant effects as well. however, no report is availableabout dmso effect on oxidative stress-induced cognition deficit i.e. alzheimer’sdisease. the present work was designed to assess the effect of chronic treatment ofdmso on stz-treated rats.methods: stz (3 mg/ kg; i.c.v.; bilateral with 10 ?l volume in either side;days 1 and 3) using a single-day version of morris water maze. the dmso (2.5, 5and 10 %v/v in saline), started from the first day, was infused for 14 days.results: the chronic administration of dmso 10% improved the distance tohidden platform (p < 0.01) in training sessions and time spent in the target quadrantin probe tests (p < 0.01). neither stz nor dmso had any intervention on velocityand visuo-motor coordination in the visible version of mwm.conclusion: totally, the results suggest that dmso may be appropriate asadjuvant therapies for the prevention of memory impairment in the experimentalmodels of alzheimer’s disease. therefore, use of dmso as a solvent inalzheimer’s disease animal studies should be considered having beneficial effectson cognitive function.