Hasan Namdar Ahmadabad - Department of Immunology, School of Medicine, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
Mohammad Hassan Zuhair - Department of Immunology, School of Medicine, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
Elahe Safari - Department of Immunology, School of Medicine, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
Mahmood Bozorgmehr - Department of Immunology, School of Medicine, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
Seyed Mohammad Moazzeni - Department of Immunology, School of Medicine, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

Objective(s)  Garlic (Allium sativum) is known as a potent spice and a medicine with broad therapeutic properties ranging from antibacterial to anticancer, and anticoagulant. One of the major purified garlic protein components is the ۴۷ kDa protein. In this study, the effect of ۴۷ kDa protein extracted from aged garlic (AGE) was evaluated on mouse dendritic cell (DC) maturation in vitro. Materials and Methods Forty seven kDa protein was purified from AGE by ammonium sulfate precipitation and gel filtration. SDS-PAGE was used to determine the molecular weight and purity of the isolated protein. DCs were purified from spleen of BALB/c mice by Nycodenz centrifugation and their adhesiveness to the plastic dish. The ۴۷ kDa protein isolated from AGE was added to DCs medium during the overnight culture and the expression of DC surface markers was assessed via flowcytometry. Results The ۴۷ kDa protein-treated DCs lowered the expression of DC maturation markers including: CD۴۰, CD۸۶ and MHC-II in comparison with non-treated DCs; (median of ۴۱% versus ۴۷%, ۸۴% versus ۹۱% and ۸۳% versus ۹۰%, respectively) but we observed no statistical difference between the two groups. Conclusion Upon treatment with DCs with ۴۷ kDa protein, DCs down regulated the expression of costimulatory and MHC-II surface molecules, which is similar to tolerogenic DC phenotype. According to the results of the present study, we found that ۴۷ kDa protein purified from AGE can be considered as a potential candidate to generate tolerogenic DCs in vitro.  

Dendritic cells, Garlic extract, Maturation Markers