ABSTRACT
Objective] To investigate the protective effect and potential mechanism of Astragalus injection on mucosa epithelial cells in rats with sepsis . [Methods] Thirty Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly divided into sham,model and Astragalus injection treatment groups with 10 rats in each group.Rat sepsis model was constructed by cecal ligation and puncture.Rats in the Astragalus injection treatment group received 800 mg·kg-1 of Astragalus injection at 15 minutes before and 6 hours after operation. Intestinal mucosa were harvested and frozen at -80℃ on post-operation 24 hours. Intestinal mucosa epithelial cell apoptosis was detected by TUNEL,while Bcl-2 and Bax levels were determined by real-time quantitative PCR(qPCR) and Western blot technique.[Results] The apoptosis indexes were 5.2±0.3,22.3±1.2 and 11.2±0.9 of sham,model and Astragalus injection treatment group,respectively. Apoptosis index in model group was significantly higher than that in sham group( P<0.05),while the apoptosis of mucosa epithelial cells was significantly attenuated after Astragalus injection treatment(P<0.05).In model group,the expression of Bcl-2 was lower than that of sham group,whereas the expression of Bax was higher than that in sham group(P<0.05).Astragalus injection treatment significantly lowered Bax level while elevated Bcl-2 expression, compared with model group(P<0.05). [Conclusion] Astragalus injection could suppress sepsis-induced apoptosis of mucosa epithelial cells via up-regulating Bcl-2 and down-regulating Bax.