Interactions between macrophages and epithelial cells in the lung may promote a damaging inflammatory response to cigarette smoke toxins. A better understanding of the mechanisms involved in this response may prove useful in the development of treatments or preventative strategies for respiratory diseases associated with exposure to cigarette smoke. To examine this possibility, human epithelial...

The proliferation of vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) serves an important role in cigarette smoking-associated vascular diseases; however, the underlying mechanisms responsible for this remain unclear. The aim of the present study was to elucidate the role of P16 in cigarette smoke extract (CSE)-induced VSMC proliferation and the underlying mechanism responsible. Human aortic smooth muscle ...

Cigarette smoking is the major cause of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and predisposes subjects to severe respiratory tract infections. Epidemiological studies have shown that cigarette smokers are seven times more likely to contract influenza infection than nonsmokers. The mechanisms underlying this increased susceptibility are poorly characterized. Retinoic acid-inducible gene (...

BACKGROUND Cigarette smoke induces a pro-inflammatory response in airway epithelial cells but it is not clear which of the various chemicals contained within cigarette smoke (CS) should be regarded as predominantly responsible for these effects. We hypothesised that acrolein, nicotine and acetylaldehyde, important chemicals contained within volatile cigarette smoke in terms of inducing inflamma...

RATIONALE Tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) is a potent pro-inflammatory mediator and its expression is up-regulated in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Tristetraprolin (TTP) is implicated in regulation of TNF-α expression; however, whether TTP is involved in cigarette smoke-induced TNF-α expression has not been determined. METHODS TTP expression was examined by western blot an...

BACKGROUND Human mast cells are capable of a wide variety of inflammatory responses and play a vital role in the pathogenesis of inflammatory diseases such as allergy, asthma, and atherosclerosis. We have reported that cigarette smoke extract (CSE) significantly increased IL-6 and IL-8 production in IL-1β-activated human mast cell line (HMC-1). Baicalein (BAI) has anti-inflammatory properties a...

Maternal smoking has been recognized as a common cause of low birth weight, preterm birth and the decrease of gestational age period. Unfortunately, there is an increasing interest within public especially woman in Iran in the tobacco products consumption. On the other hand, the deleterious effect of maternal smoking on human fetus in pregnancy period especially in the first trimester encourage...

Long-term cigarette smoking increases the risk for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), characterized by irreversible expiratory airflow limitation. The pathogenesis of COPD involves oxidative stress and chronic inflammation. Various natural marine compounds possess both anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, but few have been tested for their efficacy in COPD models. In this s...

The generation and collection of cigarette smoke (CS) is a prerequisite for any toxicology study on smoking, especially an in vitro CS exposure study. In this study, the effects on blood and vascular function were tested with two widely used CS preparations to compare the biological effects of CS with respect to the CS preparation used. CS was prepared in the form of total particulate matter (T...

Objective(s): Yu-Ping-Feng-San (YPFS) is a classical traditional Chinese medicine that is widely used for treatment of the diseases in respiratory systems, including chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) recognized as chronic inflammatory disease. However, the molecular mechanism remains unclear. Here we detected the factors involved in transforming growth factor beta 1 (TGF-β1)/Smad2 si...