Basic Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2018. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Aug 14, 2018; 24(30): 3384-3397
Published online Aug 14, 2018. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v24.i30.3384
Herb-partitioned moxibustion alleviates colon injuries in ulcerative colitis rats
Dan Zhang, Yan-Bo Ren, Kai Wei, Jue Hong, Yan-Ting Yang, Li-Jie Wu, Ji Zhang, Zheng Shi, Huan-Gan Wu, Xiao-Peng Ma
Dan Zhang, Jue Hong, Zheng Shi, Huan-Gan Wu, Xiao-Peng Ma, Laboratory of Acupuncture-moxibustion and Immunology, Shanghai Research Institute of Acupuncture and Meridian, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 200030, China
Yan-Bo Ren, Department of Integrated Traditional Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine, North Branch of Huashan Hospital, Fudan University, Shanghai 201907, China
Kai Wei, Key Laboratory of Systems Biomedicine (Ministry of Education), Shanghai Center for Systems Biomedicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China
Yan-Ting Yang, Li-Jie Wu, Ji Zhang, Xiao-Peng Ma, Yueyang Clinical Medicine School, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai 201203, China
Author contributions: Zhang D, Ren YB, Wei K and Hong J contributed equally to this work; Ma XP designed and supervised this research; Zhang D and Ren YB performed the animal experiment; Ren YB, Wei K, Hong J, Yang YT and Zhang J contributed to detection of all indexes; Zhang D wrote this manuscript and Wu LJ analyzed the data; Zhang D, Ren YB, Wei K and Hong J revised this manuscript; Shi Z and Wu HG were devoted to the guidance; all authors approved the final version of this article, including the author list.
Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 81674073, 81202754, and 81273843; Training Project for Outstanding Discipline Leaders of Shanghai Municipal Commission of Health and Family Planning, No. 2017BR047; National Key Basic Research Program of China (973 Program), No. 2015CB554501 and 2009CB522900; Budgetary Project of Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, No. 18LK050.
Institutional animal care and use committee statement: All procedures involving animals were reviewed and approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest regarding the publication of this paper.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Xiao-Peng Ma, PhD, Professor, Laboratory of Acupuncture-moxibustion and Immunology, Shanghai Research Institute of Acupuncture and Meridian, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, No. 650 South Wanping Road, Xuhui District, Shanghai 200030, China. pengpengma@163.com
Telephone: +86-21-64690257 Fax: +86-21-64382181
Received: May 9, 2018
Peer-review started: May 9, 2018
First decision: June 15, 2018
Revised: June 22, 2018
Accepted: June 30, 2018
Article in press: June 30, 2018
Published online: August 14, 2018
Abstract
AIM

To observe the effect of herb-partitioned moxibustion (HPM) on expression of colonic cytokines in ulcerative colitis (UC) rats.

METHODS

A UC rat model was established by protein immunization in combination with topical chemical stimulation. Rats in the HPM group (n = 8) received HPM at bilateral Tianshu (ST25) points. The gross injury and pathological scores of the colon were recorded. The expression profile of colonic cytokines was assayed using the protein microarray technique. Specific differential cytokines were selected and verified by ELISA. The corresponding UniProt Accessions of the differentially expressed cytokines were retrieved in the UniProt database. The pathways involved were analyzed with the help of the KEGG PATHWAY database. The DAVID database was used for functional cluster and pathway analysis.

RESULTS

HPM improved colon injuries in UC rats, manifested by accelerated repair of ulcers and alleviation of inflammation, and the gross injury and pathological scores both significantly decreased (P < 0.01). Fold change > 1.3 or < 0.77 was taken as the screening standard. There were 77 down-regulated and 9 up-regulated differentially expressed colonic cytokines in the HPM group compared with the model group, and expression of 20 differed significantly (P < 0.05). Twelve of the 20 significantly differentially expressed cytokines [β-catenin, interleukin-1 receptor 6 (IL-1R6), IL-1β, B7-1, nerve growth factor receptor, AMP-activated protein kinase-α1, neuropilin-2, orexin A, adipocyte differentiation-related protein, IL-2, Fas and FasL] were up-regulated in the model group (n = 3, compared with the normal group) but down-regulated in the HPM group (n = 3, compared with the model group). Functional cluster analysis showed that the differentially expressed colonic cytokines in the HPM group regulated apoptosis and protein phosphorylation. KEGG pathway analysis showed that 52 down-regulated and 7 up-regulated differentially expressed colonic cytokines in the HPM group had pathways. The pathways that interacted between the cytokines and their receptors accounted for the largest proportion (28 of the down-regulated and 5 of the up-regulated cytokines).

CONCLUSION

HPM promotes the repair of colon injuries in UC rats, which is related to the regulation of several abnormally expressed cytokines.

Keywords: Cytokine expression profile, Ulcerative colitis, Protein microarray, Rats, Herb-partitioned moxibustion

Core tip: Herb-partitioned moxibustion (HPM) has been shown to be effective in treating ulcerative colitis (UC) in recent years as a non-drug external therapy. In this study, we observed its effect on the expression profile of cytokines in UC rat colon. By protein functional cluster analysis and KEGG pathway analysis, we can conclude that the effect of HPM in promoting the repair of colon injuries of UC rats is plausibly related to the regulation of multiple abnormally-expressed cytokines, and the regulation of the signal pathways interacting between the cytokines and their receptors may be its significant immunological mechanism.