Investigation on effects of the nourishing kidney and eliminating toxicity decoction on immunological imbalance of Th1, Th17 and Treg in HBV transgenic mice.

Objective: To study the immune mechanism of nourishing kidney and eliminating toxicity decoction (NKETD) on Chronic Hepatitis B (CHB), we detected the serum concentrations of IFN-γ (the characteristic cytokine of Th1), IL-17A (the characteristic cytokine of Th17) and the quantitative proportion of CD(+) 4CD(+) 25 foxp3 Treg to CD(+) 4 Treg in HBV transgenic mice.

Methods: The HBV transgenic mice were randomly divided into six groups: high-dose group, middle-dose group, low-dose group, lamivudine group, model control group and normal mice control group. The serum concentrations of IFN-γ and IL-17A in mice were measured by ELISA method and the ratio of CD(+) 4CD(+) 25 foxp3 Treg to CD(+) 4 Treg was detected by Flow Cytometry Method (FCM).

Results: The decoction could increase the serum concentration of IFN-γ and decrease that of IL-17A in HBV transgenic mice. The higher the dose was, the more significantly the concentration of IFN-γ increased. And high-dose decoction could decrease the serum concentration of IL-17A in HBV transgenic mice significantly and continuously while middle-dose and low-dose decoction had no significant effects. However, there wasn't statistically significant variation on the ratio of CD(+) 4CD(+) 25 foxp3 Treg to CD(+) 4 Treg in HBV transgenic mice.

Conclusion: The decoction could treat CHB by regulating the immune function by promoting the generation of Th1 and/or enhancing its function while inhibiting Th17. The immune regulation by decoction had more significant effects than lamivudine.