Avaliação dos possíveis efeitos antiviral e imunomodulador de Pleurotus ostreatus em modelo in vitro de infecção de hepatócitos humanos (HUH-7) infectados pelo vírus dengue

Abstract

In recent decades, dengue has become one of the main public health problems. Data from the World Health Organization estimate that every year cases reach between 50 and 100 million individuals across the globe. The vectors of the disease are mosquitoes of the genus Aedes, having as main vector the species Aedes aegypti. When infection occurs, some cells such as dendritic cells, macrophages, B lymphocytes and T lymphocytes are involved in the immune response process of the host to fight the virus, then there will be the immunological activation, since the production of several cytokines such as such as MIF and IL-8. These cytokines are found at high levels generating the serious picture of the disease. Due to the absence of any antiviral and / or immunomodulatory drugs against dengue, there is a need to discover a natural product that interferes with the infection or the inflammatory response of the classic symptoms of the disease. And to find answers to this problem, some studies are directed to fungi, seeking knowledge of their therapeutic actions. Therefore, the fungus chosen in the research was Pleurotus ostreatus, which, according to the literature, has a proven biological activity. For this, a human hepatocyte cell line (Huh-7) was infected with DENV-2 and treated with different concentrations (1 μg / ml, 10 μg / ml, 50 μg / ml and 75 μg / ml) of exopolysaccharides of P ostreatus (APO) to verify cell viability, which was performed by the MTT colorimetric assay, which showed that none of the analyzed APO concentrations was considered cytotoxic on the Huh-7 lineage. In order to verify the possible antiviral activities, the NS1 Ag Dilution Plaque Kit was used to quantify the NS1 antigen and in the immunomodulatory activity the cytokine IL-8 was quantified, both activities were verified in the supernatants of the infected Huh-7. In the tests performed, no APO concentration showed antiviral or immunomodulatory activity.