Regulation of Acute Lung Inflammatory Injury by Endogenous IL-13

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

Using IgG immune complex deposition to trigger acute lung inflammation in rats, we have previously shown that exogenously administered IL-13 suppresses the acute inflammatory response. In the same model, expression of both mRNA and protein for IL-13 has now been detected. Treatment of rats with Ab to IL-13 accentuated the inflammatory response, with significant increases in lung vascular permeability and in the number of neutrophils in bronchoalveolar lavage fluids. In the presence of anti-IL-13, activation of the transcription factor, NF-kappaB, was significantly increased in lung. In addition, anti-IL-13 caused significant increases in bronchoalveolar lavage levels of TNF-alpha, macrophage inflammatory protein-2, and cytokine-inducible neutrophil chemoattractant but no changes in lung vascular ICAM-1. These data suggest that during lung inflammation endogenous IL-13 regulates NF-kappaB activation and related cytokine/chemokine generation, all of which determines the intensity of the lung inflammatory response.