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  3. Piromelatine, a novel melatonin receptor agonist, stabilizes metabolic profiles and ameliorates insulin resistance in chronic sleep restricted rats

Piromelatine, a novel melatonin receptor agonist, stabilizes metabolic profiles and ameliorates insulin resistance in chronic sleep restricted rats

  • Eur J Pharmacol. 2014 Mar 15;727:60-5. doi: 10.1016/j.ejphar.2014.01.037.
Meihua She 1,  Xiaobo Hu 2,  Zehong Su 2,  Chi Zhang 3,  Shenghua Yang 4,  Lin Ding 2,  Moshe Laudon 5,  Weidong Yin 6
Affiliations

Affiliations

  • 1 Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Life Sciences and Technology, University of South China, Hengyang, China; Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, Key Laboratory for Arteriosclerology of Hunan Province, University of South China, Hengyang, China.
  • 2 Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Life Sciences and Technology, University of South China, Hengyang, China.
  • 3 Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, Key Laboratory for Arteriosclerology of Hunan Province, University of South China, Hengyang, China.
  • 4 The First Affiliated Hospital, College of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
  • 5 Drug Discovery, Neurim Pharmaceuticals Ltd., Tel-Aviv, Israel.
  • 6 Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Life Sciences and Technology, University of South China, Hengyang, China; Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, Key Laboratory for Arteriosclerology of Hunan Province, University of South China, Hengyang, China. Electronic address: wdy20042004@126.com.
PMID: 24486392 DOI: 10.1016/j.ejphar.2014.01.037
Abstract

Chronic sleep deprivation may speed the onset or increase the severity of age-related conditions such as Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and obesity. Piromelatine (Neu-P11) is a novel melatonin agonist, which has been developed for the treatment of insomnia. Animal studies have suggested possible efficacy of piromelatine in sleep maintenance, anxiety and depression. In addition, piromelatine has been shown to inhibit weight gain and improve Insulin sensitivity in high-fat/high-sucrose-fed (HFSD) rats. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of piromelatine on Insulin sensitivity in sleep restricted rats. Sleep restriction was established by rotating cages intermittently for 20h thereby sleeping time of rats was limited to 4h per day. During 8 days of sleep restriction, rats were injected intraperitoneally with piromelatine (20mg/kg), melatonin (5mg/kg) or a vehicle. The results showed that sleep restriction increased plasma glucose, fasting Insulin, total Cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG) and oxidative stress markers while HDL-cholesterol (HDL-C) level and glucose tolerance were decreased. However, under piromelatine or melatonin treatment, the levels of plasma glucose, TG, TC decreased and HDL-C, glucose tolerance and antioxidative potency increased when compared with the vehicle-treated group. These data suggest that chronic sleep restriction in rats induce metabolic dysfunction, oxidative stress and Insulin resistance, and these symptoms were improved by treatment with piromelatine or melatonin. We conclude that piromelatine could regulate metabolic profiles and Insulin sensitivity, and attenuate Insulin resistance induced by sleep restriction.

Keywords

Agonist; Glucose tolerance; Insulin sensitivity; Melatonin; Piromelatine; Sleep restriction.

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