1. Tacrolimus prevents murine cerebral malaria
- Author
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Nguyen Tien Huy, Dang My Nhi, Shinjiro Hamano, Kenji Hirayama, and Lam Quoc Bao
- Subjects
0301 basic medicine ,medicine.medical_specialty ,Plasmodium berghei ,Immunology ,Malaria, Cerebral ,chemical and pharmacologic phenomena ,CD8-Positive T-Lymphocytes ,Parasitemia ,Organ transplantation ,Tacrolimus ,03 medical and health sciences ,Mice ,0302 clinical medicine ,Cell Movement ,parasitic diseases ,medicine ,Immunology and Allergy ,Cytotoxic T cell ,Animals ,Humans ,Cells, Cultured ,biology ,business.industry ,Brain ,Plasmodium falciparum ,Anemia ,Original Articles ,Mycophenolic Acid ,biology.organism_classification ,medicine.disease ,Mice, Inbred C57BL ,030104 developmental biology ,surgical procedures, operative ,Cerebral Malaria ,business ,Malaria ,CD8 ,Immunosuppressive Agents ,030215 immunology - Abstract
Summary Tacrolimus and mycophenolate mofetil are immunosuppressants frequently used in human organ transplantation. Tacrolimus is also reported to inhibit Plasmodium falciparum growth in vitro. Here, we report that tacrolimus prevented the death from cerebral malaria of Plasmodium berghei ANKA-infected C57BL/6J mice, but not their death from malaria due to the high parasitaemia and severe anaemia. The mycophenolate mofetil-treated mice showed higher mortality from cerebral malaria and succumbed to malaria earlier than tacrolimus-treated littermates. Tacrolimus attenuated the infiltration of mononuclear cells including pathogenic CD8+ T cells into the brain. It appears to prevent murine cerebral malaria through the inhibition of cerebral infiltration of CD8+ T cells.
- Published
- 2016