Intramuscular Injection of Expression Plasmid DNA Is an Effective Means of Long-Term Systemic Delivery of Interleukin-5

• Published in: Biochemical and biophysical research communications Vol. 233; no. 2; pp. 527 - 531
• Main Authors: Tokui, Mikiya, Takei, Izumi, Tashiro, Fumi, Shimada, Akira, Kasuga, Akira, Ishii, Masatoshi, Ishii, Toshiharu, Takatsu, Kiyoshi, Saruta, Takao, Miyazaki, Jun-ichi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 17-04-1997
• Subjects: Animals; Female; Gene Transfer Techniques; Injections, Intramuscular; Interleukin-5 - genetics; Mice; Mice, Inbred C57BL; Plasmids - genetics; Polymerase Chain Reaction; RNA, Messenger - metabolism
• ISSN: 0006-291X; 1090-2104
• DOI: 10.1006/bbrc.1997.6485

It has been demonstrated that intramuscularly injected expression plasmid DNA is taken up by myofibers and subsequently expresses exogenous genes. In the present study, we assessed intramuscular DNA injection as a means of systemically delivering interleukin-5 (IL-5). We constructed an IL-5 expression plasmid, pCAGGS-IL-5, containing murine IL-5 cDNA under the control of the CAG promoter. The soleus muscle of mice was pretreated with bupivacaine. Two days later, mice were injected with pCAGGS-IL-5 or a control pCAGGS plasmid DNA at the same site. At 2 weeks after DNA injection, eosinophils had increased from 2-3% to 8-29% of peripheral white blood cells in 9 of 10 mice injected with pCAGGS-IL-5, while eosinophils never exceeded 3% in control mice injected with pCAGGS. IL-5 mRNA was present in the muscle area injected with pCAGGS-IL-5. IL-5 was also detectable by ELISA in the sera of most mice injected with pCAGGS-IL-5, but in none of the control mice. These results demonstrate that intramuscular plasmid injection serves as a useful method of systemically delivering cytokines by combining the strong CAG promoter and bupivacaine pretreatment.