Recently, the toxic injury mechanism of H2S exposure to lung had been investigated by the animal nutrition and regulation research innovation team ofInstitute of Animal Sciences (IAS) of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. A new insight into the complex mechanisms of H2S induced lung injury was provide by using pig model for the first time. The research also provided therapeutic potentials as drug targets towards curing the intoxication caused by H2S. The related research results were published in the journal of Environmental Research.

H2S is a broad-spectrum toxicant, which is harmful to many organ systems of humans and animals, including the central nervous, respiratory, cardiovascular and the digestive system. And the respiratory tract and lungs are the most sensitive organ systems to H2S exposure. However, the injury mechanism of H2S exposure to lung remains poorly understood.

This study examined the histological damage and the mRNA expression of pro-inflammatory genes of lung in pigs exposed to H2S. Histopathology changes and increased expression of pro-inflammatory cytokines demonstrated that inflammatory injury in the porcine indeed induced by lung H2S exposure. Then TMT-based quantitative proteomics analysis was performed to probe the injury molecular mechanism. The proteomics results showed that 526 proteins have significant changes in abundance between control and H2S treated swine. Bioinformatics analysis found that multiple signaling pathways are involved, including antigen processing and presentation, complement and coagulation cascades, IL-17 signaling pathway, ferroptosis and necroptosis. This study revealed a fundamental mechanism that the combined effects of inflammation, immune suppression, mucus accumulation and cell death induced by H2S exposure leading to the observed lung injury in pig.

This work was supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2016YFD0500501).

More details are available in the link below:

http://authors.elsevier.com/a/1bl%7EN3Ao5vMBc

                   By Ma Teng (mateng@caas.cn)