Have Some Tea, Feed Your Brain: How EGCG Acts as a Protective Agent in a Parkinsonian Model

Ferrous iron is important in biological function but can be oxidized into ferric iron, at which point it causes oxidative stress. Ferric iron accumulation leading to oxidative stress is one of the factors that contributes to forms of dementia including that associated with Parkinson's Disease. A compound found in green tea called Epigallocatechin Gallate (EGCG) had been shown to act as a metal chelating factor and can naturally bypass the blood brain barrier. Using EGCG as a potential protective agent against Parkinson's disease development would provide a solution to issues regarding drug administration to the brain. We hypothesize that introducing EGCG to the media will help to prevent the oxidation of naturally occurring iron and prevent oxidative stress, leading to less cell death. In this study we used N27 dopaminergic neurons treated with 6‐ Hydroxydopamine (6OHDA) as a model for Parkinson's disease development. In the 6OHDA model for Parkinson's disease, DMT1, one of the proteins responsible for iron uptake, is upregulated increasing iron influx and stimulating oxidative stress. Prior to exposing the cell cultures to 6OHDA, varying concentrations of EGCG were introduced to determine protectiveness. We determined that the IC50 of 6OHDA (normally 35μM) was increased to 45μM upon protection with 5μM of EGCG, 50μM upon protection with 10μM of EGCG, and 55μM upon protection with 20μM of EGCG. This indicates that EGCG is protective in this Parkinsonian model and could possibly have health benefits in the diet. We are currently conducting experiments to determine how EGCG is preventing oxidative stress in this model. This abstract is from the Experimental Biology 2018 Meeting. There is no full text article associated with this abstract published in The FASEB Journal .