Protective effect of curcumin on liver against intestinal ischemia/reperfusion injury

Objective To study the protective effect of curcumin on liver against intestinal ischemia/reperfusion（I/R）injury. Methods Twenty-one KM mice were randomly divided into sham group,intestinal ischemia group（with 45min ischemia and 24h reperfusion）,and curcumin treatment group.A mouse I/R model was established.The mice in intestinal ischemia and curcumin treatment groups were injected with 0.3ml PVP-K30 and 2.5mg/ml curcumin respectively,and repeated them after 6h.The mice were killed after 24h.Pathological changes in intestine and liver were observed with hematoxylin and eosin（HE）staining.Dynamic levels of alarmine transferase（ALT）,lactate dehydrogenase（LDH）,and nobelium（NO）in liver tissues were measured using biochemical methods.Levels of cytosolic phospholipase A₂（cPLA₂）,phosphorylation of cytosolic phospholipase A₂（p-cPLA₂）,cyclooxygenase-2（COX-2）,andβ-actin were measured by Western blot. Results The pathological changes in intestine and liver were more significant in curcumin treatment group than in intestinlischemia group（P＜0.01）according to the Chiu′intestinal tissue injury assessment criteria.The ALT level was significantly lower while the NO level was significantly higher in curcumin treatment group than in intestinal ischemia group（P＜0.05）.No significant difference was found in LDH level between the two groups（P＞0.05）.Western blot showed that the expression levels of p-cPLA₂ and COX-2 in liver were higher in intestinal ischemia group than in curcumin treatment group（P＜0.01）,and lower in curcumin treatment group than in intestinal ischemia group（P＜0.01）.No significant difference was found in expression levels of cPLA₂ and β-actin between the two groups. Conclusion Curcumin can significantly improve liver damage caused by intestinal I/R by increasing the anti-oxidative ability of liver and regulating the expression of certain inflammation cytokines.