Assessment of chemokine responses involved in the cerebral and mild malaria in murine model

Abstract

Background: The role of chemokines on the integrity of Central Nervous system (CNS) during malaria infection remains unclear; we therefore, in this study investigated the alternation in gene expression of chemokines in the Brain samples of P. yoelii 17XL infected mice with Cerebral Malaria (CM) as well as Mild Malaria (MM). Objective: To evaluate the pro-inflammatory chemokine expression in the brain samples of murine CM and MM Methods: mRNA levels of IFN ?, IP-10, RANTES, MIP1-?, MIP1-? and MCP were measured by qRT-PCR in Brain samples of P. yoelii 17XL infected mice. GAPDH was used as the housekeeping gene. Histopathological studies of brain samples from infected and uninfected mice were conducted. Results: CM mice had highly up-regulated of all chemokines except IFN ? and RANTES than MM mice (all P<0.0001)); IFN ? (P=0.5133) and RANTES (P=0.9292) were found to be decreased in CM as compared to MM wherein IP-10 (P=0.1419), MIP1-? (P=0.1664), MIP1-? (P=0.6294) and MCP (P=0.8262) mRNA were significantly up regulated at peak parasitemia and remains high in the CM of experimental mouse model. Histopathology results revealed tissue section in severely parasitized mice exhibited massive degeneration of the parenchyma, consistent with marked inflammation. Conclusion: It might be concluded from the findings of the present study that up regulation of IP-10, MIP1?, MIP 1? and MCP-1 and low expression of IFN ? and RANTES in the brains of CM mice are associated with mortality of P.yoelii 17XL infected CM mice as compared to mice with MM.