Evaluation of immunomodulatory effect of crude extracts of Davilla nitida Vahl, Eugenia speciosa Cambess and Neea theifera Oerst in murine BMDM infected with Leishmania infantum

Abstract

Leishmaniasis is an infectious disease caused by species of the genus Leishmania. It is a public health problem in civil war, poor and developing countries, including Brazil. Due to their complex abilities to proliferate into macrophages of vertebrate hosts and survive in the digestive tract of sand fly vector, Leishmania spp. are an important source of infections in immunocompetent as wells as immunocompromised hosts, such as those with HIV/AIDS. Furthermore, the disease shows high frequency of late diagnosis and the current treatment is toxic and expensive. Thus, new alternative or complementary treatment is necessary. For instance, several studies have showed promising results of the leishmanicidal activity of extracts and essential oils of Brazilian plants. In the present study, we aim to evaluate the immunotherapeutic activity of the plant crude extracts of Davilla nitida, Eugenia speciosa and Neea theifera in L infantum-infected macrophages. Therefore, murine bone marrow-derived macrophages will be co-cultured with the promastigotes form of L. infantum. After 6 hours, the culture will be treated, or not, with the crude extracts at three different concentrations (0,25, 0,5 and 1 mg/ml) in association with Amphotericin B (1 mg/ml). After 18 hours, we are going to determinate the phagocytic index, number of amastigotes inside of the cells, amount of viable parasites and production of cytotoxic (nitric oxide and hydrogen peroxide) and inflammatory (IL-1², MIP-1±, TGF-²1, TNF-±, IFN-³, IL-10 e IL-6) mediators. (AU)