Evaluation of the Efficacy of Nicotine in Treatment of Allergic Asthma in Balb/C Mice Publisher Pubmed



Mazloomi E¹ ; Ilkhanizadeh B² ; Zare A³ ; Mohammadzadeh A⁴ ; Delirezh N⁵ ; Shahabi S¹
Source: International Immunopharmacology Published:2018

Abstract

Nicotine, an nAChR agonist, shows prominent anti-inflammatory properties, and some studies have illustrated its suppressive effects on inflammation. Here, we have examined whether nicotine as a medicine may have beneficial effects on the treatment of asthma in a mouse model of allergic asthma. BALB/c mice were sensitized with OVA and alum. Two weeks later, the mice received nicotine with concentrations of 1 and 10 mg/kg three times every other day. After 10 days, the mice were challenged with OVA (5%) using an ultrasonic nebulizer and died the next day. Our results showed that the administration of nicotine reduced lung-tissue inflammation, the number of eosinophils in bronchoalveolar fluid, allergen-specific IgE and IL-4 production, while it increased the TGF-β/IL-4 ratio and the number of Treg cells. Our results showed that nicotine applies its suppressive effects in a dose-dependent manner: administration of 10 mg/kg of nicotine showed more suppressive effects than 1 mg/kg. Such data suggested that nicotine might be a good candidate to be used as a medicine in the treatment of allergic asthma by decreasing allergic inflammation severity and potentiating Treg cells proliferation against the allergen. © 2018