AQP4 and brain injury: It also has been shown that upregulation of AQP4 mediated cerebral edema and neuronal death after traumatic brain injury (Kapoor et al., 2013; Xiao and Hu, 2014; Zhang et al., 2016) and inhibiting AQP4 expression with safranal led to attenuation of edema, reduced apoptosis, and inhibition of inflammation after traumatic SCI (Zhang et al., 2015).