Plasma infusions into porcine cerebral white matter induce early edema, oxidative stress, pro-inflammatory cytokine gene expression and DNA fragmentation: implications for white matter injury with increased blood-brain-barrier permeability.

Plasma infused into porcine cerebral white matter induces both acute interstitial and delayed vasogenic edema. Edematous white matter contains extracellular plasma proteins and rapidly induces oxidative stress as evidenced by increased protein carbonyl formation and heme oxygenase-1 induction. We tested the hypothesis that edematous white matter would also upregulate pro-inflammatory cytokine gene expression and develop DNA damage.