Inhibiting histone deacetylase 6 partly protects cultured rat cortical neurons from oxygen-glucose deprivation-induced necroptosis

Necroptosis has an important role in ischemia-reperfusion damage. The expression of histone deacetylase 6 (HDAC6) is upregulated in neurons following ischemia-reperfusion, however, whether HDAC6 is closely involved in the necroptosis, which occurs during ischemia-reperfusion damage remains to be elucidated. In the present study, the roles of HDAC6 in the necroptosis of cultured rat cortical neurons were investigated in a oxygen-glucose deprivation (OGD) model. The results demonstrated that OGD induced marked necroptosis of cultured rat cortical neurons and upregulated the expression of HDAC6 in the cultured neurons, compared with the control (P<0.05). The necroptosis inhibitor, necrostatin-1 (Nec-1), decreased The expression of HDAC6 in the OGD-treated cultured neurons, accompanied by the inhibition of necroptosis. Further investigation revealed that, compared with OGD treatment alone, inhibiting the activity of HDAC6 with tubacin, a specific HDAC6 inhibitor, reduced the OGD-induced necroptosis of the cultured rat cortical neurons (P<0.05), which was similar to the change following treatment with Nec-1 (P>0.05). In addition, inhibiting the activity of HDAC6 reversed the OGD-induced increase of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and the OGD-induced decrease of acetylated tubulin in the cultured rat cortical neurons (P<0.05), compared with the neurons treated with OGD alone). The levels of acetylated tubulin in the cultured neurons following treatment with OGD and tubacin were significantly higher than those in the control (P<0.05). These results suggested that HDAC6 was involved in the necroptosis of neurons during ischemia-reperfusion by modulating the levels of ROS and acetylated tubulin.