Down-regulation of thymic stromal lymphopoietin by curcumin

Background: thymic stromal lymphopoietin (tslp) is a cytokine implicated in the pathogenesis of allergic diseases such as asthma,atopic dermatitis and allergic rhinitis. curcumin has various effects such as antidepressant,antioxidant,antihyperglycemic,antitumor and anti-inflammatory. however,the effect of curcumin on the production of tslp has not been clarified. thus,we investigated how curcumin inhibits the expression and production of tslp in the human mast cell line,hmc-1 cells. methods: we used enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay,reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction,luciferase assay,and caspase-1 assay to investigate the effects of curcumin. results: the results show that curcumin inhibited the production and mrnaexpression of tslp in hmc-1 cells: the maximal inhibition rate of tslp production by curcumin (50 μm) was 59.16 ± 4.20%. in addition,curcumin suppressed the nuclear factor-kb luciferase activity induced by phorbol myristate acetate plus a23187. in the activated hmc-1 cells,caspase-1 activity was increased,whereas caspase-1 activity was decreased by pretreatment with curcumin. conclusion: these results suggest that curcumin can be used to treat inflammatory and atopic diseases through the suppression of tslp. copyright © 2013 by institute of pharmacology.