It is well known that IL-10 is able to suppress inflammatory cytokine expression and the activation of inflammatory macrophages in injured spinal cord [
20]. In the next series of experiments, we investigated whether the intralesional administration of hIL-10 mRNA-LNP alters the morphological and thus the molecular microenvironment of the lesion area. First, we examined and quantified the GSA-B4-positive microglia/macrophage densities 1, 2, and 5 d after injection in the affected spinal segment. Strong GSA-B4 densities were detected in SCI animals, whose spinal cord displayed high GSA-B4 expression in the epicenter of lesion with considerably weaker staining intensities detected rostrally and caudally from the lesion cavity. Similar expression of CD68 and Iba-1 was observed (Figs. S8A to C and S9A to C). Similar changes were found in the animals receiving eGFP mRNA-LNP at all examined time points (Fig.
6A and B). In contrast, moderately decreased GSA-B4 densities were observed following intralesional delivery of hIL-10 mRNA-LNP (Fig.
6C). The quantitative analysis of CD68, Iba-1, and GSA-B4 densities clearly showed that intralesional administration of hIL-10 mRNA-LNP significantly decreased the densities of CD68-, Iba-1-, and GSA-B4-positive cells compared with the injured spinal cords of SCI and mRNA-GFP animals at all examined time points (Fig.
6D to F and Figs. S8D to F and S9D to F). The significantly suppressed level of microglia/macrophage densities found in the mRNA-hIL-10 group moved us to hypothesize that there could be a differential production of cytokines in the control (SCI and mRNA-GFP groups) and treated (mRNA-hIL-10 group) spinal cords. We evaluated semiquantitatively the expression of 29 cytokines through the use of the Proteome Profiler array and determined the expression in pooled samples (Fig.
6G to J). On day 5 after hIL-10-LNP treatment, remarkably higher chemiluminescence signal of tissue inhibitor of matrix metalloproteinase 1 (TIMP-1) and ciliary neurotrophic factor (CNTF) was measured in the affected segment of the mRNA-hIL-10 group compared with the SCI and the mRNA-GFP animals. Although protein expression of hIL-10 was markedly decreased 5 d after intraspinal administration of hIL-10 mRNA (Fig.
3C), slightly increased expression of TIMP-1 and CNTF appeared as a time-delayed secondary effect. The circulating cytokines were also evaluated within the first 5 d in blood serum following intralesional injection of saline (SCI animals) or mRNA-LNP (mRNA-GFP and mRNA-hIL-10 groups) into the injured cords. No considerable change of cytokine levels was observed in the blood serum of the mRNA-hIL-10 animals compared with that of the SCI or mRNA-GFP animals (Fig. S10), except for the mild decrease of serum RANTES levels in the mRNA-hIL-10 group compared with the SCI and the mRNA-GFP animals by day 5 after treatment. In contrast, cytokine-induced neutrophil chemoattractant-1 (CINC-1) serum levels were mildly depressed in mRNA-hIL-10 and mRNA-GFP animals on day 2 compared with the SCI animals. These results suggest that intralesional administration of mRNA-LNP encoding hIL-10 has strong anti-inflammatory effect and results in a delayed expression of potent neuromodulatory factors in the affected spinal segments [
21]. Rat cytokine changes 1 and 2 d after mRNA-LNP administration were detected by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) analysis (Fig.
6K and L). Quantification of IL-6 mRNA in the spinal cord showed significantly increased levels, while that of tumor necrosis factor-a (TNF-a) and chemokine (C-C motif) ligand 3 (CCL3) mRNAs revealed significantly decreased levels of these cytokines at both examined time points in the hIL-10 mRNA-treated group (mRNA-hIL-10) compared with the mRNA-GFP group. IL1-b mRNA levels were significantly decreased on day 1 but showed nonsignificant changes on day 2 after treatment in the hIL-10 mRNA-treated animals.