Pharmacological inhibition of CXCR2 alleviates neuropathic pain by inactivating microglia in a rat L5 spinal nerve ligation model.

Pharmacological inhibition of CXCR2 alleviates neuropathic pain by inactivating microglia in a rat L5 spinal nerve ligation model. Am J Transl Res. 2020;12(7):3803-3812 Authors: Zhou W, Zhou Y, Wang M, Qian C, Wang C, Tang J, Cai Z, Dai W, Zhu X Abstract Peripheral nerve injury (PNI)-induced neuropathic pain is a prevalent and severe clinical problem. It has been shown that microglia-mediated neuroinflammation plays a crucial role in neuropathic pain. The present study investigated the abnormal expression of C-X-C motif chemokine receptor type 2 (CXCR2) in a rat L5 spinal nerve ligation (SNL) model and evaluated the role of SB225002, a specific antagonist of CXCR2, in repressing neuroinflammation and neuropathic pain. It was found that CXCR2 expression was significantly upregulated in the dorsal horn of L5-SNL rats compared with sham control. Moreover, CXCR2 expression was increased in spinal microglia of rats after L5-SNL. Based on these results, the present study further examined whether pharmacological inhibition of CXCR2 suppressed microglial activation and neuropathic pain. It was demonstrated that SB225002 treatment inhibited L5-SNL-induced microglia proliferation and activation. Furthermore, SB225002 also significantly suppressed the L5-SNL-induced pro-inflammatory response, as indicated by decreased production of tumor necrosis factor-α, interleukin (IL)-1β and IL-6 in spinal cord tissues. The results indicated that SB22500...
Source: American Journal of Translational Research - Category: Research Tags: Am J Transl Res Source Type: research