Effect of mucirin, a bioactive fraction of Acorus calamus l, as mucin regulator in human lung epithelial cultured cells

Guntur Berlian, Olivia Mayasar

Abstract

Mucus hypersecretion is an important feature of airway inflammatory diseases. In this study, we investigated the effect of Mucirin, a standardized bioactive fraction of Acorus calamus rhizome, on MUC5AC mucin gene expression induced by elastase in lung epithelial cells as well as its mechanism of action. Human lung epithelial NCI-H292 cells were pretreated with elastase to induce MUC5AC expression and treated with Mucirin overnight. We found that 10 μg/mL of Mucirin repressed the expression of MUC5AC at both mRNA and protein levels up to 59 and 60 %, respectively. Mucirin decreased markedly protein expression of molecules involved in MUC5AC transcription such as receptor-ligand EGFR (350%) and TGFα (46%). Moreover, our western blot analysis also demonstrated that Mucirin inhibited TGFα activation, while TNFα and NFκB expressions were significantly decreased as well. These results suggest that Mucirin inhibited elastase-induced MUC5AC expression in human lung epithelial cells through TNFα-EGFR-TGFα-NFκB pathway. The ability of Mucirin on down-regulation proinflammatory cytokine is likely to improve the molecular evidences of A. calamus as a potential drug candidate to treat diseases related to mucus hypersecretion, including cough, bronchitis and COPD.