To investigate the protective effect and mechanism of 3-acetyl-11-keto-β-boswellic acid (AKBA) on cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury in rats.

A total of 80 rats were randomly divided into a sham operation group, a model group, a low-dose group and a high-dose group, with 20 rats in each group. Except for the sham operation group, a middle cerebral artery ischemia-reperfusion injury model was induced by a modified suture method in the other three groups. The rats in the low-dose group were given an intraperitoneal injection of 10 mg / kg AKBA at 60 min after successful reperfusion, while the rats in the high-dose group were given 20 mg / kg AKBA. The rates of cerebral infarction and apoptosis were measured and calculated in the four groups. The messenger RNA (mRNA) expression of microRNA-320(miRNA-320) and insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) was detected by reverse transcription real-time fluorescence quantitative PCR, and the protein expression of IGF-1 was measured by Western-blotting.

The cerebral infarction rate, apoptosis rate, miRNA-320 mRNA, IGF-1 mRNA and IGF-1 protein among the four groups all showed significant differences (F = 193.300, 230.000, 100.900, 180.400, 26.180; all P < 0.001). Further pairwise comparison revealed that the apoptosis rate, miRNA-320 mRNA, IGF-1 mRNA and IGF-1 protein in the model group were much higher than those in the sham operation group (all P < 0.05). The rates of cerebral infarction and apoptosis and the expression of miRNA-320 mRNA were much lower, while the expression of IGF-1 mRNA and protein was much higher in the low-dose group and high-dose group than in the model group (all P < 0.05).

AKBA has an obvious protective effect on cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury in rats, and it may be to reduce neuronal apoptosis by inhibiting miRNA-320 and up-regulating IGF-1.