Modulação da resposta imunológica no pulmão de Camundongos co-infectados com Mycobacterium bovis e Strongyloides venezuelensis

Abstract

A rising number of people have been contracting tuberculosis around the world even though a multitude of reports involving a modulation of the immune response to Mycobacterium have been published. The response to Mycobacterium is mainly mediated by Th1 lymphocytes through IFN-gamma production. Parasitic diseases account for a large proportion of human morbidity and mortality, considering the number of people affected by them and several pathologies associated to parasitic infection. Helminthic infections drive towards Th2 response which leads to IL-4, IL5 and IL-13 production. The present study evaluated the immune response of coinfected animals or not with Strongyloides venezuelensis (SV) and Mycobacterium bovis-BCG (MB) on pulmonary cells collected from BALB/c mice at time points 1 (4th and 7th days post-immunization [dpi] by MB and SV, respectively) and 2 (7th and 10th dpi by MB and SV, respectively). Animals were infected with 700 SV larvae subcutaneously, and 3 days after, 1x106 CFU of wild MB strain intravenously. The number of worms and eggs was counted as well as cytokine (IFN-gamma, IL-4 and IL-10) and chemokine (CCL2 and CCL5) assessments, and the MPO and EPO levels determination on pulmonary tissue from infected and/or coinfected animals. In addition, PCR for MB detection, the histopathology and the expression of costimulatory molecules such as CD80, CD86, CD28, CTLA-4 and CD25 on pulmonary tissue were also assessed. The results pointed that MB led to increase SV parasite burden in coinfected mice (COIN) at both time points analyzed. The PCR technique detected effectively MB. Moreover, elevated IFN-gamma and reduced IL-4 and EPO levels were detected on pulmonary tissue in the COIN group. In regard to CD80 molecule, there was an increased expression at time point 1 and diminished expression at time point 2. Also, higher amounts of IL-10 were found on pulmonary tissue in MB and COIN groups. The histopathological analysis revealed pulmonary granulomas with a number of neutrophils, macrophages and epithelial cells-like in the MB group as well as granulomas in an advanced stage with caseous necrosis in the COIN group. Based on these findings, it may be concluded that MB modulated the immune response to SV, leading coinfected animals to be more susceptible to helminthic infection. On the other hand, SV modulated the MB infection by modifying the characteristics of the pulmonary granulomas in the COIN group at time point 1 probably due the reduced IL-4 production in this group.