Abstract: Objective To investigate the effect of ulinastatin (UTI) of different dosages on MMP-2 expression in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced acute lung injury (ALI) of neonatal rats and analyze whether the changes having dosage-depend or not. Methods Forty neonatal rats of 7-days were randomly divided into saline control group, acute lung injury group, low(25,000U/kg),middle(50,000U/kg), and high(100,000U/kg) dosage of UTI groups(n=8). The neonatal rats of the ALI and UTI treated were established by intraperitoneal injection LPS, meanwhile, the neonatal rats of low, middle, and high groups were treated with different dosages UTI. The pathological changes of lung tissues were observed. The expression MMP-2 protein and mRNA in the lung tissues were detected by using immunohistochemistry and reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Results The level of MMP-2 mRNA and protein in middle and high dosage of UTI groups were lower than in LPS-induced ALI group ( <0.05,0.01); the level in low dosage of UTI group was lower than in LPS-induced ALI group, but there was not significantly different ( ﹥0.05). Conclusions UTI can decrease the levels of MMP-2 in LPS-induced ALI of neonatal rats and has dosage-dependence. |