Heparin disaccharides inhibit tumor necrosis factor-alpha production by macrophages and arrest immune inflammation in rodents.

Inflammation is the clinical expression of chemical mediators such as the pro-inflammatory cytokine tumor necrosis factor (TNF-)-alpha produced by macrophages and other cells activated in the immune response. Hence, agents that can inhibit TNF-alpha may be useful in treating arthritis and other diseases resulting from uncontrolled inflammation. We now report that the cleavage of heparin by the enzyme heparinase I generates sulfated disaccharide (DS) molecules that can inhibit the production of TNF-alpha.

Keratinocytes-associated chemokines and enzymatically quiescent heparanase induce the binding of resting CD4+ T cells.

Whether the chemokines macrophage inflammatory protein-1 beta (MIP-1 beta) and regulated on activation normal T expressed and secreted (RANTES), which interact specifically with glycosaminoglycans and thus mediate the recruitment, attachment, and migration of leukocytes to vascular endothelia and extracellular matrix, are also involved in interactions between CD4+ murine T lymphocytes and keratinocytes was examined. We have previously observed that depending on the local pH, a mammalian extracellular matrix-degrading enzyme, endo-beta-D glucuronidase (heparanase), which cleaves heparin sulfate proteoglycans, can function wither as an enzyme or as an adhesion molecule for CD4+ T lymphocytes. Herein, the involvement of heparanase in T cell-keratinocyte interactions was also probed.