Interleukin-37: The Effect of Anti-Inflammatory Response in Human Coronary Artery Endothelial Cells

Figure 1

IL-37 is a “dual function” anti-inflammation cytokine. IL-37 exerts anti-inflammatory responses beginning with the nuclear activity intracellularly. IL-37 can recruit Smad3 in the cytoplasm and then comes into being a complex of Smad3 and IL-37, which induces the nuclear activity of IL-37. Then the complex translocates into the nucleus to suppress TLR-induced proinflammatory cytokine. Meanwhile, NF-κB may be phosphorylated by IKK in the cytoplasm and then exposures to the nuclear to regulate the transcription of proinflammatory cytokine, such as ICAM-1, VCAM-1, MCP-1, TNF-α, and IL-6. But the phosphorylation of NF-κB can be inhibited by IL-37, which in turn decreases the production of proinflammatory cytokine.