α-Cyclodextrin/Moringin Impacts Actin Cytoskeleton Dynamics with Potential Implications for Synaptic Organization: A Preliminary Transcriptomic Study in NSC-34 Motor Neurons.

α-Cyclodextrin/Moringin (α-CD/MOR) is an isothiocyanate showing neuroprotective and antioxidant properties. In this work, we studied in differentiated NSC-34 motor neurons cell line the molecular pathways activated following a treatment of 96 h with α-CD/MOR at different doses, namely 0.5, 5 and 10 μM. Taking advantage of comparative transcriptomic analysis, we retrieved the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and we mapped DEGs to synaptic genes using the SynGO database. Then, we focused on the biological pathways in which they are involved. We observed that the prolonged treatment with α-CD/MOR significantly modulated biological processes and cellular components associated with synaptic organization. Interestingly, the KEGG pathway "Regulation of actin cytoskeleton" was overrepresented, alongside pathways related to synapses and axon guidance. Specifically, SPIA analysis indicated that the "Regulation of actin cytoskeleton" pathway was found to be activated with the highest dose of α-CD/MOR. Moreover, α-CD/MOR also modulated transcription factors involved in synaptic plasticity, such as Creb1. These results could indicate that α-CD/MOR can influence synaptic functions and organization, being involved in synaptic plasticity through the modulation of actin dynamics.