Enteric glial reactivity to systemic LPS administration: Changes in GFAP and S100B protein

- Systemic LPS administration induced intestinal inflammation and enteric glial response.
- Two glial markers were evaluated S100B and GFAP, at different times and doses of LPS.
- S100B content increased after 24 h after LPS, but decreased at 7 days in all regions.
- LPS increased S100B secretion in the cecum, but no serum S100B changes were observed.
- LPS also increased GFAP in all regions at 24 h, but earlier in the cecum.

Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) is used to induce inflammation and promotes nervous system activation. Different regions of the brain present heterogeneous glial responses; thus, in order to verify whether systemic LPS-induced inflammation affects the enteric glia differently across the intestinal segments, we evaluated the expressions of two glial activity markers, GFAP and S100B protein, in different intestine segments, at 1 h, 24 h and 7 days after acute systemic LPS administration (0.25 or 2.5 mg kg−1) in rats. Histological inflammatory analysis indicated that the cecum was most affected when compared to the duodenum and proximal colon at the highest doses of LPS. LPS induced an increased S100B content after 24 h in all three regions, which decreased at 7 days after the highest dose in all regions. Moreover, at 24 h, this dose of LPS increased ex-vivo S100B secretion only in the cecum. The highest dose of LPS also increased GFAP in all regions at 24 h, but earlier in the cecum, where LPS-induced enteric S100B and GFAP alterations were dependent on dose, time and intestine region. No associated changes in serum S100B were observed. Our results indicate heterogeneous enteric glial responses to inflammatory insult, as observed in distinct brain areas.