Abstract
Currently asthma is considered to be an inflammatory disease characterized by airway hyperresponsiveness and pulmonary eosinophilia, and mediated by Th lymphocytes expressing a Th 2 cytokine pattern. In many recent studies, molecular biological methods have been used to investigate the role of cytokines in pathogenesis and new therapeutic targets of asthma. Objectives: We aimed to identify the effect of Haepyoijin-tang on the transcriptional activities of cytokines involved in the asthma model. Materials and Methods: RBL-2H3 cell lines were used. Cells were stimulated with DNP-IgE or Calcium inophore+PMA for maximal gene expression. After 24 hours of Haepyoijin-tang-treatment, total cellular RNAs were collected using the Trizol solution method. Then the transcriptional activities of cytokines(IL-1, 4, 5, 10, 13, $TNF-{\alpha}$) were measured by RT-PCR with electrophoresis. Results: DNP-IgE and Calcium inophore+PMA induced IL-4/IL-5 production separately peaked at 3 hours after the stimulation, but the efficacy was better in the Calcium inophore+PMA group. In the IL-4 study, sample groups of 10%, 1 %, 0.01 % Haepyoijin-tang-treatment showed 83%, 98%, 96% of transcriptional activities compared to the control group. In the IL-5 study, sample groups of 10%, 1%, 0.1 %, 0.01 % Haepyoijin-tang showed 97%, 99%, 99%, 99% of transcriptional activities compared to the control group. In other studies any result was not obtained. Conclusions: This study shows that Haepyoijin-tang has an inhibitory effect on the transcription of IL-4 and IL-5 gene expression in RBL-2H3 cell lines. Advanced studies are required to investigate the mechanisms of inhibition by herbal medicine in the asthma model.
