Acetyl-L-carnitine and oxaloacetate in post-treatment against LTP impairment in a rat ischemia model. An in vitro electrophysiological study

Overcoming the blood-brain barrier for the therapy of malignant brain tumor: current status and prospects of drug delivery approaches

Besides the broad development of nanotechnological approaches for cancer diagnosis and therapy, currently, there is no significant progress in the treatment of different types of brain tumors. Therapeutic molecules crossing the blood-brain barrier (BBB) and reaching an appropriate targeting ability remain the key challenges. Many invasive and non-invasive methods, and various types of nanocarriers and their hybrids have been widely explored for brain tumor treatment. However, unfortunately, no crucial clinical translations were observed to date. In particular, chemotherapy and surgery remain the main methods for the therapy of brain tumors. Exploring the mechanisms of the BBB penetration in detail and investigating advanced drug delivery platforms are the key factors that could bring us closer to understanding the development of effective therapy against brain tumors. In this review, we discuss the most relevant aspects of the BBB penetration mechanisms, observing both invasive and non-invasive methods of drug delivery. We also review the recent progress in the development of functional drug delivery platforms, from viruses to cell-based vehicles, for brain tumor therapy. The destructive potential of chemotherapeutic drugs delivered to the brain tumor is also considered. This review then summarizes the existing challenges and future prospects in the use of drug delivery platforms for the treatment of brain tumors.

L-Carnitine and Acetyl-L-carnitine Roles and Neuroprotection in Developing Brain

L-Carnitine functions to transport long chain fatty acyl-CoAs into the mitochondria for degradation by β-oxidation. Treatment with L-carnitine can ameliorate metabolic imbalances in many inborn errors of metabolism. In recent years there has been considerable interest in the therapeutic potential of L-carnitine and its acetylated derivative acetyl-L-carnitine (ALCAR) for neuroprotection in a number of disorders including hypoxia-ischemia, traumatic brain injury, Alzheimer's disease and in conditions leading to central or peripheral nervous system injury. There is compelling evidence from preclinical studies that L-carnitine and ALCAR can improve energy status, decrease oxidative stress and prevent subsequent cell death in models of adult, neonatal and pediatric brain injury. ALCAR can provide an acetyl moiety that can be oxidized for energy, used as a precursor for acetylcholine, or incorporated into glutamate, glutamine and GABA, or into lipids for myelination and cell growth. Administration of ALCAR after brain injury in rat pups improved long-term functional outcomes, including memory. Additional studies are needed to better explore the potential of L-carnitine and ALCAR for protection of developing brain as there is an urgent need for therapies that can improve outcome after neonatal and pediatric brain injury.

Acetyl-l-carnitine restores synaptic transmission and enhances the inducibility of stable LTP after oxygen-glucose deprivation

Hypoxic circumstances result in functional and structural impairments of the brain. Oxygen-glucose deprivation (OGD) on hippocampal slices is a technique widely used to investigate the consequences of ischemic stroke and the potential neuroprotective effects of different drugs. Acetyl-l-carnitine (ALC) is a naturally occurring substance in the body, and it can therefore be administered safely even in relatively high doses. In previous experiments, ALC pretreatment proved to be effective against global hypoperfusion. In the present study, we investigated whether ALC can be protective in an OGD model. We are not aware of any earlier study in which the long-term potentiation (LTP) function on hippocampal slices was measured after OGD. Therefore, we set out to determine whether an effective ALC concentration has an effect on synaptic plasticity after OGD in the hippocampal CA1 subfield of rats. A further aim was to investigate the mechanism underlying the protective effect of this compound. The experiments revealed that ALC is neuroprotective against OGD in a dose-dependent manner, which is manifested not only in the regeneration of the impaired synaptic transmission after the OGD, but also in the inducibility and stability of the LTP. In the case of the most effective concentration of ALC (500μM), use of a phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K) inhibitor (LY294002) revealed that the PI3K/Akt signaling pathway has a key role in the restoration of the synaptic transmission and plasticity reached by ALC treatment.