RESUMEN
INTRODUCTION: Most of the immunosuppressive drugs are used for the treatment of autoimmune disease, allergic diseases, and transplant rejection, but toxicity is the major obstacle for the potent drugs in the wide use of these immunosuppressive drugs. Daphnetin, a Chinese herbal product, has been reported that daphnetin possesses antimicrobial, anticoagulation, antimalarial, anticancer, and antioxidant activity. In a previous study, we found that daphnetin exhibited a potential immunosuppressive effect on LPS-induced B lymphocyte cells in vitro, therefore, in this research, we investigated the immunosuppressive effects of daphnetin in BALB/c mice use OVA as a prototype antigen. METHODS: Sixty BALB/c mice were divided into six groups. The emulsion (100 µL containing 100 µg OVA) was injected subcutaneously with OVA + CFA into the shaved backs of the BALB/c mice on day 1, and a boosting injection was administered in OVA + IFA 2 weeks later. Beginning on the day of immunization, the immunized mice were administered intraperitoneally with daphnetin at a dose of 5, 10, and 20 mg/kg in saline solution for 28 consecutive days. We measured the effect of daphnetin on OVA-specific antibody, cytokine production, and Splenocyte proliferation in vivo. RESULTS: The results revealed that daphnetin significantly suppressed serum immunoglobulin G levels (IgG), and the OVA-specific IgG subclasses IgG1 and IgG2b, daphnetin was also significantly decreased the Th1 and Th2 cytokine productions, inhibited the splenocytes proliferation rate in vivo. CONCLUSIONS: It proved that daphnetin could suppress humoral response activity on OVA-sensitized mice, suggesting a potential role on daphnetin as a new immunosuppressive drug.