Protective effects of taurine on LPS-induced myocardial damage in rats / 中国病理生理杂志

ABSTRACT

AIM:To investigate the effects of taurine on lipopolysaccharide ( LPS)-induced myocardial damage in rats.METHODS:Healthy male SD rats ( n=30) were randomly divided into control group ( CON) , LPS model group ( LPS) and taurine treatment group ( TAU) .The rats in CON group and LPS group were intravenously injected with normal saline, and the rats in TAU group were injected with taurine (100 mg/kg).After 2 h, the rats in LPS group and TAU group were intraperitoneally injected with LPS at 10 mg/kg, and the rats in CON group were injected with normal saline . Six hours after injection of LPS , the blood samples were collected for determination of superoxide dismutase ( SOD) activi-ty, malondialdehyde (MDA) content, and tumor necrosis factor α(TNF-α) and interleukin-6 (IL-6) levels.The myocar-dial tissues were processed for histological examination and the analysis of Western blot .RESULTS:Compared with CON group, LPS significantly reduced SOD activity in the serum and heme oxygenase 1 ( HO-1) protein expression in the myo-cardial tissues, increased the serum content of MDA and levels of TNF-αand IL-6.LPS also significantly elevated the lev-els of TNF-αand IL-6, and up-regulated the cyclooxygenase-2 ( COX-2) expression and phosphorylation of nuclear factor kappa B ( NF-κB) in the myocardial tissues .Taurine pretreatment significantly elevated SOD activity and HO-1 protein ex-pression level, decreased the levels of COX-2, TNF-α, IL-6 and phosphorylated NF-κB.Histological observation showed that taurine reduced inflammatory response in the myocardial tissue .CONCLUSION: Taurine attenuates LPS-induced myocardial damage in rats .The beneficial effects of taurine may be associated with its reduction of p-NF-κB/COX-2 signa-ling by activation of HO-1/CO.