ATP release from mast cells by physical stimulation: a putative early step in activation of acupuncture points.

Lina Wang,Ryszard Grygorczyk,Jacek Sikora,Lei Hu,Xueyong Shen,Wolfgang Schwarz

doi:10.1155/2013/350949

Abstract

In Chinese medicine acupuncture points are treated by physical stimuli to counteract various diseases. These stimuli include mechanical stress as applied during the needle manipulation or tuina, high temperatures as applied during moxibustion, and red laser light applied during laser acupuncture. This study aimed to investigate cellular responses to stimuli that might occur in the tissue of acupuncture points. Since they have a characteristically high density of mast cells that degranulate in response to acupuncture, we asked whether these processes lead to ATP release. We tested in in vitro experiments on mast cells of the human mast-cell line HMC-1 the effects of the physical stimuli; mechanical stress was applied by superfusion of the cells with hypotonic solution, heat was applied by incubation of the cells at 52°C, and red laser light of 657 nm was used for irradiation. We demonstrate that all the stimuli induce ATP release from model human mast HMC-1 cells, and this release is associated with an intracellular free Ca2+ rise. We hypothesize that ATP released from mast cells supplements the already known release of ATP from keratinocytes and, by acting on P2X receptors, it may serve as initial mediator of acupuncture-induced analgesia.

Highlights

The treatment of specific points on the body surface by physical stimuli has been shown to affect various body functions including pain sensation [1, 2] and the cardiovascular system
For mechanical stimulation of HMC-1 cells the perfusion solution in the flowthrough filter chamber was changed at t = 0 to 50% hypotonic solution
We have shown that physical stimulation of Mast cells (MCs) results in mast-cell degranulation [6, 12, 13], which forms an early step in acupuncture effects [5]

Summary

Introduction

The treatment of specific points on the body surface by physical stimuli has been shown to affect various body functions including pain sensation [1, 2] and the cardiovascular system (see, e.g., [3]). Physical stimuli are applied in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) [4,5,6]: in needling acupuncture mechanical stress occurs during manipulation of lifting, thrusting, and twisting [5], and in moxibustion high temperatures exceeding 50∘C are applied to the skin. Mast cells (MCs) play a significant role in the pathophysiology of many diseases including asthma and allergies, pulmonary fibrosis, and rheumatoid arthritis [8]. In addition to these deleterious activities, MCs are involved in protection from inflammation and help to maintain tissue homeostasis [9]. MCs were shown to participate in the mechanism of analgesia induced by needling acupuncture [5], moxibustion [10], and laser acupuncture [11]. Activation of transient receptor potential channel TRPV2 in the mast-cell membrane

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