Fig. 6: AEA induces airway relaxation ex and in vivo in OVA-sensitized mice.
From: The endocannabinoid anandamide is an airway relaxant in health and disease
a Top: phase contrast microscopy pictures of a small intrapulmonary Balb/c mouse airway. 1–3) Pictures represent time points during perfusion in the graph (bottom), scale bar = 50 µm. Bottom: Original trace of changes in airway lumen area. AEA (10 µM) reverses the reduction of lumen area by 5-HT (0.1 µM) in the acute OVA model. b Statistical analysis reveals strong airway relaxation by AEA (n = 5 independent animals) but not EtOH (n = 3 independent animals) in intrapulmonary airways of OVA-sensitized mice with acute asthma, unpaired two-tailed Student’s t test *p = 0.012). c, d Top: phase contrast microscopy pictures of a small intrapulmonary Balb/c mouse airway. (1–3) Pictures represent time points during perfusion in the graph (bottom), scale bar = 50 µm. Bottom: original trace of changes in airway lumen area. AEA (10 µM) reverses the reduction of lumen area by 5-HT (0.1 µM) (c) in the chronic OVA model, a similar effect is found in controls without asthma (NaCl) (d). e Statistical analysis reveals strong airway relaxation by AEA (n = 6 independent animals) but not EtOH (n = 3 independent animals) in intrapulmonary airways of OVA-sensitized Balb/c mice with chronic asthma as well as in control mice (NaCl, n = 3 independent animals), one way ANOVA, Tukey’s post hoc test (OVA AEA vs OVA EtOH **p = 0.0025). f Analysis of airway resistance at baseline and after the subsequent inhalation of 25 mg/ml 5-HT together with AEA (0.5 mg per mouse, n = 7 independent animals) or the solvent EtOH (n = 8 independent animals) in Balb/c mice with acute OVA asthma. AEA limits the increase of airway resistance by 5-HT. Repeated measures two way ANOVA, Bonferroni’s post hoc test (baseline vs AEA ***p = 3.6 × 10−4; baseline vs EtOH ***p = 8.7 × 10−7; AEA vs EtOH **p = 0.0032). All data are presented as mean values ± SEM. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.
