Figure 8.

AICAR inhibits the expression of proinflammatory mediators in serum and brain cerebral cortex of LPS-injected rats. a, Rats were given saline intraperitoneally with or without AICAR (100 mg/kg) 1 hr before LPS administration (0.5 mg/kg). Blood and organs were taken out 6 hr after LPS injection. The levels of NO (i), TNFα (ii), IFNγ (iii), and IL-1β (iv) were measured in serum by ELISA as discussed in Materials and Methods. Results are the means ± SD of six determinations. ^*p < 0.001 compared with LPS treatment; ^#p < 0.001 compared with control; NS, not significant. b, Immunoblot was performed for iNOS protein in peritoneal macrophages isolated at 6 hr. c, For determination of expression of cytokines, spleen was isolated from treated rats and total RNA was isolated by Trizol reagent (Invitrogen) for gene array (Superarray). Results are the representation of two independent experiments. The cerebral cortex was isolated from treated rats and total RNA was isolated as mentioned before. d, The expression of iNOS, TNFα, and IL-1β was examined by RT-PCR as discussed in Materials and Methods. The blots are representative of two experiments.