Protective Effect of Curcumin on Endotoxin-induced Acute Lung Injury in Rats

Acute lung injury (ALI) or its more severe form, the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), is a common, devastating clinical syndrome that affects both medical and surgical patients. The most common cause of ALI is sepsis. There is now well-documented evidence that pulmonary inflammation contributes to the devel-opment of ALI. Despite significant advances in our un-derstanding of pathophysiology and technologies in the supportive management, mortality from ALI remains excessive. C…

Protective effect of curcumin on endotoxin-induced acute lung injury in rats

To investigate the protective effect of curcumin on endotoxin-induced acute lung injury in rats, and explore the underlying mechanisms, 24 male Wistar rats were randomly divided into 4 ex-perimental groups: sham-vehicle (S), sham-curcumin (C), lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-vehicle (L), and curcumin-lipopolysaccharide (C-L) groups. The wet/dry (W/D) weight ratio of the lung and bron-choalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid protein content were used as measures of lung injury. Neutrophil re-cruitment and activation were evaluated by BAL fluid cellularity and myeloperoxidase (MPO) activ-ity in cell-free BAL and lung tissue. The levels of cytokine-induced neutrophil chemoattractant-1 (CINC-1) in lung tissues were measured by ELISA. The histopathological changes of lung tissues were observed by using the HE staining. Our results showed that lung injury parameters, including the wet/dry weight ratio and protein content in BALF, were significantly higher in the L group than in the S group (P<0.01). In the L group, higher numbers of neutrophils and greater MPO activity in cell-free BAL and lung homogenates were observed when compared with the S group (P<0.01). There was a marked increase in CINC-1 levels in lung tissues in response to LPS challenge (P<0.01, L group vs S group). Curcumin pretreatment significantly attenuated LPS-induced changes in these indices. LPS caused extensive morphological lung damage, which was also lessened after curcumin pretreatment. All the above-mentioned parameters in the C group were not significantly different from those of the S group. It is concluded that curcumin pretreatment attenuates LPS-induced lung injury in rats. This beneficial effect of curcumin may involves, in part, inhibition of neutrophilic re-cruitment and activity, possibly through inhibition of lung CINC-1 expression.