Short general anaesthesia induces prolonged changes in gene expression in the mouse hippocampus

The long-term molecular changes in the central nervous system constitute an important aspect of general anaesthesia, but little is known about to what extent these molecular changes are affected by anaesthesia duration. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effects of short duration (20 min) general anaesthesia with isoflurane or avertin on the expression of 20 selected genes in the mouse hippocampus at 1 and 4 days after anaesthesia.

Nine to eleven-weeks-old male mice received one of the following treatments: 20 min of avertin-induced anaesthesia (n=11), 20 min of isoflurane-induced anaesthesia (n=10) and no anaesthesia (n=5). One and four days after anaesthesia, gene expression in the hippocampus was determined with reverse transcription quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction.

We found that anaesthesia led to the upregulation of six genes: Hspd1 (heat shock protein 1), Plat (tissue plasminogen activator) and Npr3 (natriuretic peptide receptor 3) were upregulated only 1 day after anaesthesia, whereas Thbs4 (thrombospondin 4) was upregulated only 4 days after anaesthesia. Syp (synaptophysin) and Mgst1 (microsomal glutathione S-transferase 1) were upregulated at both time points. Hspd1, Mgst1 and Syp expression was increased regardless of the anaesthetic used, Npr3 and Plat were increased only in mice exposed to avertin, and Thbs4 was upregulated only after isoflurane-induced anaesthesia.

This study shows that some of the effects of short general anaesthesia on gene expression in the mouse hippocampus persist for at least 4 days.