Mercaptoethylguanidine inhibits the inflammatory response in a murine model of chronic infection with Pseudomonas aeruginosa.

Chronic airway inflammation induced by Pseudomonas aeruginosa is the eventual cause of respiratory failure in most people affected by cystic fibrosis. Recent evidence implicates the involvement of free radical and oxidant stress in the pathogenesis of the inflammatory injury. Here we report the efficacy of a novel experimental therapeutic, mercaptoethylguanidine (MEG), which has combined actions as a selective inhibitor of the inducible nitric oxide synthase and as a scavenger of peroxynitrite, a potent oxidant formed in the reaction of nitric oxide and superoxide radical. Chronic pulmonary infection was established in FVB/N mice by intratracheal administration of 10(5) colony-forming units of P. aeruginosa in agar beads. Treatment with MEG (10 mg/kg/dose every 8 h i.p.) inhibited weight loss in the first 3 days and reduced histologic injury at 8 days postinfection. MEG also reduced myeloperoxidase activity, a marker of neutrophil infiltration, at 8 days and concentrations of the proinflammatory cytokines interleukin-1beta, tumor necrosis factor-alpha, and macrophage inflammatory protein 2 in whole lung homogenates. MEG-treated animals and controls had similar perioperative mortality and comparable colony counts of P. aeruginosa at 8 days, indicating that MEG did not exacerbate infection. Our data suggest that MEG may be an effective immunomodulatory therapy of pulmonary inflammation induced by chronic infection.

Generation of a transgenic mouse with lung-specific overexpression of the human interleukin-1 receptor antagonist protein.

The purpose of the studies described here was to test the hypothesis that overexpression of the human interleukin-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1ra) in the distal airway epithelia of mice would result in amelioration of the inflammatory effects of IL-1alpha. The coding region of the human IL-1ra gene was placed under transcriptional control of the 5' flanking region of the human SP-C gene. Transgenic mice were generated by pronuclear injection of the transgene and identified by Southern blot analysis of genomic DNA. RNA expression of the transgene was confirmed by Northern blot analysis. In order to determine whether expression of the transgene conferred protection against inflammatory stimuli, control and transgenic mice were treated with IL-1alpha by intratracheal instillation. Six hours after treatment, bronchoalveolar lavage was performed, which revealed a statistically significant decrease in the degree of neutrophilia in the transgenic mice as compared with control mice. Furthermore, there was a significant reduction in the whole-lung myeloperoxidase concentration. Reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction analysis of whole-lung RNA revealed a significant reduction in the messenger RNA/beta-actin ratio of macrophage inflammatory protein-1alpha (MIP-1alpha) and MIP-2 in the transgenic animals as compared with controls. The results of these studies indicate that distal airway epithelial cell expression of human IL-1ra results in partial protection from IL-1alpha-induced airway inflammation and injury.

RNA polymerase II promoter strength in vitro may be reduced by defects at initiation or promoter clearance.

We have measured the ability of three TATA box promoters, adenovirus 2 major late (Ad 2 ML), Ad 2 ML with a point mutation in the TATA box, and mouse beta-globin, to support abortive and productive RNA synthesis in vitro. We have also measured the ability of these promoters to direct the assembly of preinitiation complexes using a nuclease protection assay. The relative strengths in productive transcription, determined from the synthesis of RNAs 10 nucleotides or longer, were 12:6:1 for Ad 2 ML, mouse beta-globin, and the TATA mutant of Ad 2 ML. However, the TATA mutant was reduced only 4-fold in its ability to assemble preinitiation complexes, compared to Ad 2 ML. Complexes formed on the Ad 2 ML TATA mutant may therefore also be reduced in their ability to initiate transcription. The mouse beta-globin promoter directed assembly and initiation as well as Ad 2 ML, but the beta-globin transcription complexes were less able to clear the promoter, resulting in an increase in aborted transcripts at the expense of productive RNA synthesis. We have thus shown that the transcriptional strength of eukaryotic promoters may be determined not only at the step of transcription complex assembly but also at the level of promoter clearance and possibly at transcription initiation as well.