Gut derived-endotoxin contributes to inflammation in severe ischemic acute kidney injury

BACKGROUND: Recent researches indicate that the intestinal consequences of renal ischemia reperfusion (IR) would predispose to the translocation of gut-derived endotoxin. Here, we designed experiments to test the hypothesis that the gut-derived endotoxin has a potential role in mediating local inflammatory processes in the acutely injured kidney. METHODS: Rats were performed sham or renal IR surgery (60 min of bilateral renal ischemia, then 24 h of reperfusion) (n = 5). The intestinal structural and mucosa permeability were evaluated. Serum endotoxin and bacterial load in liver and mesenteric lymph nodes (MLN) were measured. Separate groups were pretreated with oral norfloxacin 20 mg/kg/day or saline for 4 weeks and divided into sham plus saline, sham plus norfloxacin, renal IR plus saline and renal IR plus norfloxacin group. Serum biochemistry and endotoxin were determined. Kidney pathological changes were scored. Protein or mRNA expression of toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4) and proinflammatory mediators were measured in kidney homogenate. RESULTS: Renal IR led to marked intestinal integrity disruption and increase in intestinal permeability. These are accompanied by low grade of endotoxemia as well as increased bacterial load in liver and MLN. The group pretreated with norfloxacin showed significant attenuation of the increase in serum urea, ALAT, ASAT and endotoxin. The increased renal protein or mRNA of TLR4 and proinflammatory mediators (IL-6 and MCP-1) in the unpretreated animals was significantly attenuated in the norfloxacin-pretreated animals. However, norfloxacin pretreatment did not produce any protective effects on renal tubular integrity. CONCLUSIONS: Our results show for the first time that gut-derived endotoxin, resulting from an increased intestinal permeability after severe renal IR, subsequently amplifies intrarenal inflammatory response by activation renal TLR4 signaling. Our study results do not establish that antibiotic administration was effective in improving the overall renal outcome. However, our findings may be the first step to understanding how to tailor therapies to mitigate intrarenal inflammation in select groups of patients. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12882-018-1199-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.