NIU Liª²Wen, YANG Zhen, XIAO Liang, ZHANG Aiª²Long, LI Dongª²Jian, WU Jianª²Li

    Department of General Surgery, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, China

    ¡¾Abstract¡¿ AIM: To investigate the therapeutic effect of vitamin E(Vit E) and its mechanisms on liver fibrosis induced by Schistosoma japonicum infection in mice. METHODS: Mice were infected with Schistosoma japonicum cercariae percutaneously, and were divided into 5 groups: normal control group, model group, and intervention groups which were treated with three different doses of Vit E, 150, 50, and 5 mg/kg. That live fibrosis reached grade¢ò or above was considered to be a marker of therapeutic start. The mice were killed at the end of the 8th week. Liver lesions were evaluated using HE and VG staining. Immunohistochemistry for ¦Áª²smooth muscle actin (¦Áª²SMA) as an activated hepatic stellate cell(HSC) marker was performed to detect and quantify activated HSC by SP technique. The malondialdehyde (MDA) content and superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity in liver tissue were determined by spectrophotometric method. The ¦Á1(I) procollagen mRNA expression was measured by RTª²PCR. RESULTS: Vit E reduced MDA content [(5.00¡À0.31) ¦Ìmol/g vs (11.66¡À1.84) ¦Ìmol/g, P<0.05] and increased SOD activity[(249.84¡À26.22) ¦Ìkat/g vs (120.11¡À42.61) ¦Ìkat/g, P<0.05] in the liver in model group in a doseª²dependent manner. Besides, Vit E decreased the number of ¦Áª²SMA positive cells [(0.41¡À0.02) vs (0.68¡À0.02), P<0.05] in a doseª²dependent manner. Further, Vit E diminished the increased collagen content [(0.23¡À0.01) vs (0.60¡À0.11), P<0.05] and inhibited the increased ¦Á1 (I) procollagen mRNA expression [(0.28¡À0.01) vs (0.85¡À0.15), P<0.05] in the liver in model group. CONCLUSION: Vit E has evident therapeutic effects on liver fibrosis resulted from Schistosoma japonicum infection in mice, and the mechanisms are associated with antiª²lipid peroxidation, inhibition of HSC activation and proliferation, and reduction of ¦Á1(I) procollagen mRNA expression and collagen production by Vit E. ......