Taurine attenuates hippocampal and corpus callosum damage, and enhances neurological recovery after closed head injury in rats

•Taurine attenuates hippocampal injury after closed head injury in rats.•Taurine reduced white matter damage after closed head injury in rats.•Taurine protects closed head injury through suppressing calpain over-activation.•Taurine reduced degradation of structural proteins after closed head injury in rats.

The protective effects of taurine against closed head injury (CHI) have been reported. This study was designed to investigate whether taurine reduced white matter damage and hippocampal neuronal death through suppressing calpain activation after CHI in rats. Taurine (50 mg/kg) was administered intravenously 30 min and 4 h again after CHI. It was found that taurine lessened the corpus callosum damage, attenuated the neuronal cell death in hippocampal CA1 and CA3 subfields and improved the neurological functions 7 days after CHI. Moreover, it suppressed the over-activation of calpain, enhanced the levels of calpastatin, and reduced the degradation of neurofilament heavy protein, myelin basic protein and αII-spectrin in traumatic tissue 24 h after CHI. These data confirm the protective effects of taurine against gray and white matter damage due to CHI, and suggest that down-regulating calpain activation could be one of the protective mechanisms of taurine against CHI.