title: Therapeutic effect of C-phycocyanin extracted from blue green algae in a rat model of acute lung injury induced by lipopolysaccharide.
abstract: C-Phycocyanin (CPC), extracted from blue green algae, is a dietary nutritional supplement due to its several beneficial pharmacological effects. This study was conducted to evaluate whether CPC protects against lipopolysaccharide- (LPS-) induced acute lung injury (ALI) in rats. Rats were challenged with LPS (5 mg/kg body weight) intratracheally to induce ALI. After 3 h LPS instillation, rats were administrated with CPC (50 mg/kg body weight, i.p.) for another 3 h. Our results showed that posttreatment with CPC significantly inhibited LPS-induced elevation of protein concentration, nitrite/nitrate level, release of proinflammatory cytokines, the number of total polymorphonuclear cells in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid, and lung edema evidenced by decrease of lung wet/dry weight ratio accompanied by a remarkable improvement of lung histopathological alterations. Furthermore, CPC significantly attenuated LPS-induced myeloperoxidase activity, O2 (-) formation, expression of inducible nitric oxide synthase, and cyclooxygenase-2 as well as nuclear factor-kappa B (NF- κ B) activation in lungs. Additionally, CPC significantly downregulated proapoptotic proteins such as caspase-3 and Bax, but upregulated antiapoptotic proteins such as Bcl-2 and Bcl-XL in lungs exposed to LPS. These findings indicate that CPC could be potentially useful for treatment of LPS-related ALI by inhibiting inflammatory responses and apoptosis in lung tissues.
authors.affiliation: Department of Intensive Care, Chi Mei Medical Center Liou Ying Campus, Tainan, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Pak-On
authors.initials: PO
authors.lastname: Leung
authors.forename: Hao-Hsien
authors.initials: HH
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: Yu-Chien
authors.initials: YC
authors.lastname: Kung
authors.forename: Ming-Fan
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Tsai
authors.forename: Tz-Chong
authors.initials: TC
authors.lastname: Chou