Background and aim: Multiple sclerosis is one of the most common autoimmune inflammatory diseases in young ages. Many aspects of this disease are still unknown. The aim of the present study was to investigate the expression and activity level of 15-lipoxygenase-1 (a producer of lipid peroxide and regulating inflammation and immune responses) in peripheral blood mononuclear cells in patients with multiple sclerosis and healthy individual and considering its correlation with lipid profile of individuals.
Materials and Methods: 30 patients of Firouzgar Hospital in Tehran with multiple sclerosis and 23 healthy subjects as control group have participated in this case-control study. The peripheral blood mononuclear cells of the subjects were used for mRNA extraction and cDNA construction, and to determine the expression level of 15-LOX-1 gene, a Real-Time PCR-based
Cyber Green method was used and data were analyzed using ΔΔCT method. Also, the amount of 15-lipoxygenase-1 product (15-S-HETE) in serum was determined by high pressure liquid chromatography (HPLC). Finally, statistical analysis was performed using Graph Pad Prism software version 5 and independent t-test
.
Results: Measurement of 15-lipoxygenase-1 expression level in mononuclear blood cells extracted from the peripheral blood of patients with multiple sclerosis and healthy controls revealed that the level of this gene was significantly increased in patients comparing to controls. Also, the activity of 15-lipoxygenase-1 which was measured via its metabolite level in serum of patients and controls demonstrated that the enzyme activity was increased in serum of patients comparing to controls (p <0.05). Also, the results have shown that in patients with higher level of Cholesterol, Triglyceride and LDL, the level of 15-lipoxygensae-1 and its metabolite had higher level comparing to patients with normal lipid profile.
Conclusion: The results of the current study have shown that the 15-lipoxygenase-1 enzymatic pathway might affect Multiple Sclerosis pathogenesis and due to the significant differences of the enzyme level in patients comparing to controls, it can be noticed as a possible pathway for controlling disease. Since elevated lipid profile level is the risk factor of Multiple Sclerosis pathogenesis, in this study the correlation was observed between the higher level of LDL, Cholesterol and Triglyceride and enzyme expression level and activity which emphasize on the important role of lipid metabolic pathway in Multiple Sclerosis.