Abstract:To study the mechanism of benzo-α-pyrene (Bap) induced inflammatory injury in pulmonary epithelial cells and explore the protective effect of pericarpium citri reticulatae phenolics, the phenolics in pericarpium citri reticulatae was isolated and their anti-inflammatory potency in Bap induced human lung epithelial type II cells (A549) was explored. The expressions of inflammatory factors and the protein expression in NF-κB, aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AHR) pathways were detected, and the protective potency of the phenolics was explored. Six phenolics were isolated and their structures were identified, among whichaspidin BB can reduce by 3.74% apoptosis in Bap-induced A549 cell. Further, aspidin BB inhibited the secretion of NO and the inflammatory factors (IL-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α) by 49.22%, 26.79%, 37.86% and42.94% respectively. Western blotting results showed that aspidin BB significantly inhibited the activation of AHR and NF-κB pathways induced by Bap stimuli. The phenolics isolated from the pericarpium citri reticulatae can regulate the AHR and NF-κB pathways to attenuate the inflammatory and oxidant damages induced by the Bap stimuli.
