Gene therapy of experimental autoimmune thyroiditis mice by in vivo administration of plasmid DNA coding for human interleukin-10.

AIM: To investigate the effect of interleukin-10 (IL-10) gene on experimental autoimmune thyroiditis mice.

METHODS

Mice were immunized to induce autoimmune thyroiditis with porcine thyroglobulin (pTg), and thyroids of mice were injected with IL-10 DNA. On d 28 after immunization with pTg, mRNA expression of IL-10 in thyroid glands was detected and thyroid specimens were histopathological studied.

RESULTS

The mRNA expression of IL-10 was detected in thyroid glands on d 7 and 14 after injection of IL-10 plasmid DNA or on COS-7 cells 48 h after IL-10 plasmid DNA transfection. In addition, hIL-10 levels in culture media significantly increased 48 h and 72 h after IL-10 plasmid DNA transfection. Infiltration index of lymphocytes (1.1+/-0.4) in thyroids of IL-10-treated mice was significantly lower than that of pcDNA3-null-treated mice (2.2+/-0.5) (P<0.01). Compared with pcDNA3-null control mice, IL-10-treated mice had lower levels of serum IFN-gamma (P<0.01).

CONCLUSION

The direct injection of DNA expression vectors encoding IL-10 into thyroid significantly inhibited development of lymphocytic infiltration of thyroid of autoimmune thyroiditis mice, and alleviated the progression of this disease.