Abstract
The effects of intraperitoneally administered chitosan and cyclodextrins (CDs) on the generation of superoxide anion (O-2) in mouse peritoneal macrophages (MPs) were investigated.
MPs obtained from mice injected chitosan, α-CD or β-CD generated larger amount of O-2 during phagocytosis of opsonyzcd zymosan or when stimulated by 12-o-tetradccanoylphorbol-13-acetate than those from mice injected proteose peptone, a widely used elicitor for MPs. Especially, gnerated O-2 from β-CDelicited MPs was as strikingly large as that from MPs elicited by lentinan (LN), a strong antitumor polysaccharide. These results suggest the possibility that β-CD may act as a host defense stimulator.
In LN-elicited MPs, striking increase of O-2 generation was not inhibited by the protein kinase C (PKC) inhibitor 1- (5-isoquinolinylsulfonyl) -2-methylpipera-zine (H-7), but completely disappeared when the calmodulin (CaM) antagonist N- (6-aminohexyl) -5-chloro-1-naphthalenesulfonamide (W-7) was added In contrast, both H-7 and W-7 reduced the aug_mentation of O-2 generation by β-CD, although neither H-7 nor W-7 completely inhibited this augmentation. These results suggest that the augmentation of O-2 generation by LN might be due only to the increased activity of CaM in the MPs, but that the augmentation by β-CD might be due to the increased activity of both PKC and CaM in the MPs.
