The central nervous system (CNS) is one of the first physiological systems to be affected in sepsis. During the exacerbated systemic inflammatory response at the early stage of sepsis, circulatory inflammatory mediators are able to reach the CNS leading to neuroinflammation and, consequently, long-term impairment in learning and memory formation is observed. The acute treatment with molecular hydrogen (H2) exerts important antioxidative, antiapoptotic, and anti-inflammatory effects in sepsis, but little is known about the mechanism itself and the efficacy of chronic H2 inhalation in sepsis treatment. Thus, we tested two hypotheses. We first hypothesized that chronic H2 inhalation is also an effective therapy to treat memory impairment induced by sepsis. The second hypothesis is that H2 treatment decreases sepsis-induced neuroinflammation in the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex, important areas related to short and long-term memory processing. Our results indicate that (1) chronic exposure of hydrogen gas is a simple, safe and promising therapeutic strategy to prevent memory loss in patients with sepsis and (2) acute H2 inhalation decreases neuroinflammation in memory-related areas and increases total nuclear factor E2-related factor 2 (Nrf2), a transcription factorthat regulates a vast group of antioxidant and inflammatory agents expression in these areas of septic animals.

中文翻译：

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慢性分子氢吸入可减轻多微生物败血症的短期和长期记忆丧失。

中枢神经系统 (CNS) 是败血症中最先受到影响的生理系统之一。在脓毒症早期，全身炎症反应加剧期间，循环炎症介质能够到达中枢神经系统，导致神经炎症，因此观察到学习和记忆形成的长期损害。分子氢 (H2) 的急性治疗在脓毒症中发挥重要的抗氧化、抗细胞凋亡和抗炎作用，但对其机制本身和长期吸入 H2 在脓毒症治疗中的疗效知之甚少。因此，我们测试了两个假设。我们首先假设慢性 H2 吸入也是治疗败血症引起的记忆障碍的有效疗法。第二个假设是 H2 治疗减少了海马和前额叶皮层中败血症引起的神经炎症，这些区域与短期和长期记忆处理相关。我们的结果表明（1）长期接触氢气是一种简单、安全且有前景的治疗策略，可预防脓毒症患者的记忆丧失；（2）急性 H2 吸入可减少记忆相关区域的神经炎症并增加总核因子 E2-相关因子 2 (Nrf2)，一种转录因子，可调节脓毒症动物这些区域中大量抗氧化剂和炎症因子的表达。