The main pathological changes of Alzheimer's disease (AD) include amyloid-beta protein-induced hippocampal neuronal injury and neurite outgrowth impairment.

Hippocampal Neurons Share on Pinterest
After hippocampal neurons were treated with amyloid-beta (23-25) for 2 days, viable cells exhibited regular and round nuclei with pallid blue fluorescence, whereas apoptotic cells (arrows) were characterized by condensation and fragmentation of nuclei.
Credit: Neural Regeneration Research

Phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K)/Akt pathway and mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway are the important signaling pathways respectively responsible for regulating synaptic plasticity and neuronal survival.

In view of the fact that ginsenoside Rb1 exhibits anti-aging and anti-dementia effects, Prof. Qionglan Yuan and her team, Department of Anatomy & Neurobiology, Tongji University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China performed a study, in which ginsenoside Rb1 was used, and found that ginsenoside Rb1 promoted hippocampal neuronal neurite outgrowth and protected against neurotoxicity induced by amlyloid-beta (23-25) via a mechanism involving Akt and extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2 signaling.

Related results were published in Neural Regeneration Research (Vol. 9, No. 9, 2014).

Article: " Neuroprotective effects of ginsenoside Rb1 on hippocampal neuronal injury and neurite outgrowth," by Juan Liu, Jing He, Liang Huang, Ling Dou, Shuang Wu, Qionglan Yuan (Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology, Tongji University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China)

Liu J, He J, Huang L, Dou L, Wu S, Yuan QL. Neuroprotective effects of ginsenoside Rb1 on hippocampal neuronal injury and neurite outgrowth. Neural Regen Res. 2014;9(9):943-950.