The Effect of Endurance Exercise Training on the Expression of Brain- Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) and Nerve Growth Factor (NGF) Genes of the Cerebellum in Diabetic Rat

Objective: Few studies have been conducted on variations of the central nervous system of diabetic patients and much fewer investigations done on the cerebellum of diabetes patients. The current research aims to investigate the effect of endurance training on neurotrophic factors affecting the cerebellum in the diabetic rat. Materials and Methods: This study is experimental.Twenty Wistar rat were randomly allocated in four groups including: (1) control (n=5), (2) diabetic exercise (n=5), (3) healthy-control (n=5), (4) and exercise-healthy (n=5). Diabetes were induced by intraperitoneal Streptozotocin injection. The endurance exercise training was performed at moderate intensity for six weeks. Expression of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and nerve growth factor (NGF) genes were measured using the Real-Time PCR method in the cerebellum of the rat. Two-way ANOVA test was used for comparing the means of expression of genes between groups. All statistical analyses were done using SPSS 22 software. Results: A significant increase was observed in the expression of NGF (from 1.03±0.11 to 1.61±0.24; P-value≤ 0.05) and BDNF (from 1.59±0.06 to 3.24±0.46; P-value≤ 0.05) genes in male rats with experimental diabetes and healthy subjects after six weeks endurance training. Conclusion: Endurance training may be helpful for diabetic patients by increasing the neurotrophic factors and thereby preventing diabetes-related neural complications.