Local intra-articular injection of rapamycin inhibits NLRP3 activity and prevents osteoarthritis in mouse DMM models

Abstract

This study investigated the influence of autophagy on the expression of Collagen type II and light chain 3 (LC-3) in the articular cartilage of osteoarthritis (OA) models. The expression of OA associated biomarkers namely Matrix metalloproteinase (MMP-13), NOD-, LRR- and pyrin domain-containing 3 (NLRP3) induced by destabilizing the medial meniscus operation (DMM) were also investigated. A total of 60 C57BL/6 mice were divided into (1) control; (2) DMM2; (3) DMM8; (4) rapamycin 2 weeks; and (5) rapamycin 8 weeks groups. Saffranin O-Fast green staining, histomorphometry and immunohistochemical methods were used for analysis. In the DMM group, the expression of the OA biomarkers MMP-13, NLRP3 significantly increased, whilst Collagen II and LC-3B levels were significantly lower than other experimental groups. We hypothesized that NLRP3 inhibits autophagy activation and delays disease progression.

Keywords:

• Rapamycin
• autophagy
• NLRP3
• OA
• DMM

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare having no competing financial interests.

Author contributions

All authors had been involved in drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content, and all authors approved the final version to be published.

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded by Ningxia Medical University Scientific Research Project (XY201825).