【Animal Modeling】-How to build a chronic obstructive pulmonary disease model?

  Objective: To construct a rat model of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease through smoking, protease infusion and a combination of the two methods, and to evaluate the effectiveness of the model in terms of inflammation, imaging, and pathology.

  Method: Use smoking, protease infusion, and a combination of these two methods to model COPD rats. 60, 30, 30 animals in each group, 20 in the control group. The rats are weighed weekly. Smoking group and control group rats were modeled for 24 hours, 1, 2, 4, 8, 12, 16, 20 and 24 weeks, and protease group and protease + smoking group were modeled. In 24 hours, one, two, and it's done. 4, 8 or 12 weeks for cytokine detection, micro-CT and pathological examination. Analysis of variance or Kruskal-Wallis H test is used for statistical analysis.

  Result: From the 7th week, the weight gain of rats in the smoking group and protease+smoking group was significantly slower than that of the control group (Pu003c0.05). The levels of interleukin-10 in the protease group and the protease+smoke group at 24 hours, 1 week, 2 weeks and 4 weeks were significantly lower than those of the control group (Pu003c0.05). The concentration of matrix metalloproteinase-9 in the protease group and the protease+smoked group at 24 h was significantly higher than that of the control group (Pu003c0.05). The changes of emphysema can be seen on microCT and pathological images in the protease group, protease + smoking group for 4 weeks, and smoking group for 8 weeks.

  Conclusion: The method of smoking, protease, protease + smoking can successfully construct a rat COPD model. Micro-CT can sensitively and truly reflect the pathological changes of the lungs.