Oregonin reduces lipid accumulation and proinflammatory responses in primary human macrophages

Funding Information: This work was supported by the Swedish Research Council ( 521-2013-3588 ), the Swedish Heart-Lung Foundation ( 20130231 ), and Laboratory Medicine, Sahlgrenska University Hospital , Gothenburg Sweden. Publisher Copyright: © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license.Inflammation in the vascular wall is important for the development of atherosclerosis. We have previously shown that inflammatory macrophages are more abundant in human atherosclerotic lesions than in healthy arteries. Activated macrophages produce reactive oxygen species (ROS) that promote local inflammation in atherosclerotic lesions. Here, we investigated the role of oregonin, a diarylheptanoid, on proinflammatory responses in primary human macrophages and found that oregonin decreased cellular lipid accumulation and proinflammatory cytokine secretion. We also found that oregonin decreased ROS production in macrophages. Additionally, we observed that treatment of lipopolysaccharide-exposed macrophages with oregonin significantly induced the expression of antioxidant-related genes, including Heme oxygenase-1 and NADPH dehydrogenase quinone 1. In summary, we have shown that oregonin reduces lipid accumulation, inflammation and ROS production in primary human macrophages, indicating that oregonin has anti-inflammatory bioactivities.publishersversionPeer reviewe