Transcriptional Response of Adult Mouse Brain to Hypoxia

Since normal brain function depends upon continuous oxygen delivery and short periods of hypoxia can precondition against subsequent ischemia, this study examined the effects of brief hypoxia on the whole genome transcriptional response in adult mouse brain. Genomic expression profiling was perfromed for individual brain regions of the adult mice following the entire time course of hypoxia preconditioning. Adult C57BL/6 male mice were exposed to systemic preconditioning hypoxia (8% O2 ) for 3 hr and allowed to recover in normoxia for 24 hr. The mouse brains were removed and dissected into individual brain regions at multiple time points during the 3hr hypoxia and subsequent 24hr reoxygenation periods. Total RNA was purified from the human whole blood or individual mouse brain regions. Genomic scale gene expression was then measured with Affymetrix Mouse Expression 430 2.0 arrays.