Gastrodin (GAS), a monomeric component exacted from the herb Gastrodia elata BI, may have cardioprotective effects during injury caused by myocardial ischemia/reperfusion (I/R). For the significant role of autophagy in I/R process, we targeted to explore whether autophagy was contributing to the GAS-induced protective effects during I/R procedure. Male C57BL/6 mice were subjected to reversible left coronary artery ligation and cultured neonatal rat cardiomyocytes (NRCs) exposed to hypoxia were preconditioned with GAS prior to ischemia or hypoxia, following reperfusion for 2 h or re-oxygennation for 3 h respectively. Our results demonstrated that GAS pretreatment increased autophagy and reduced apoptosis during I/R, this effect was weakened by co-treatment with the autophagic flux inhibitor chloroquine (Cq). Compared to mice subjected solely to I/R, GAS-pretreated mice had a notably smaller heart infarct size and an elevation in cardiac function. In GAS-pretreated NRCs, WB data showed that autophagy was promoted (expression of p62 was inhibited and LC3II was increased). In addition, tandem fluorescent mRFP-GFP-LC3 assays illustrated that autophagosomes were degraded duo to an increase in autophagic flux. Co-administration of Cq blocked the autophagic flux. Furthermore, GAS pretreatment increased the mitochondrial membrane potential of NRCs with subjected to H/R and increased the cardiomyocyte survival rate. These protective effects were reversed with Cq. Besides, GAS-induced the enhaucement of autophagy may correlated with activating AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) phosphorylation and reduced Mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) phosphorylation, which was abrogated by Compound C (Corn C, AMPK-specific inhibitor). Our results establish that GAS pretreatment attenuates myocardial I/R injury by increasing autophagic flux aimed at eliminating dysfunctional mitochondria, therefore protecting neighbouring mitochondria and cardiomyocytes. (C) 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.