In the current study, using in vitro ischemia models of glutamate excitotoxicity and oxygen glucose deprivation (OGD) of primary cultured neurons to mimic penumbral conditions in in vivo focal ischemia models, we determined the effect of PBEF on apoptotic cell death, apoptotic inducing factor (AIF) translocation, caspase-3 activation, mitochondrial fragmentation and biogenesis. This evidence concerns the gene CASP3 and ischemia.