[Inhibitory effect of resveratrol on the proliferation of synoviocytes in rheumatoid arthritis and its mechanism in vitro].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effect of resveratrol on the proliferation and apoptosis of synoviocytes in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) in vitro and explore its mechanism. METHODS: The levels of cell proliferation of synoviocytes in RA after 24 h treated with different concentrations of resveratrol were measured by monotetrazolium colourmetric assay method. The percentages of synoviocytes apoptosis in RA after 24 h treated with different concentrations of resveratrol were tested by TUNEL and flow cytometry. The relative activities of caspase-3 were determined by colorimetric assay after 4, 8, 12, 18, and 24 h treated with resveratrol (200 micromol/L) and 12 h treated with different concentrations of resveratrol. The cleavages of pro-caspase-3 were analyzed by Western blot after 24 h treated with different concentrations of resveratrol. RESULTS: The levels of cell proliferation of synoviocytes with RA after 24 h treated with different concentrations of resveratrol were significantly decreased compared with the control group (P<0.01). The percentages of the apoptotic cells were increased of resveratrol-treated after 24 h, the apoptosis rates between the treated groups and the control group were significantly different (P<0.01). When the synoviocytes in RA were treated with 200 micromol/L resveratrol for different time respectively, the caspase-3 activity began to rise significantly at 4h, reaching the peak at 12 h, and was still much higher than that of the control group at 24 h (P<0.01). After the cells were treated with different concentrations of resveratrol for 12 h, caspase-3 activity increased in a concentration-dependent manner. After synoviocytes in RA were treated with different concentrations of resveratrol for 24 h, the expressions of pro-caspase-3 decreased as the concentration increased, the caspase-3 active fragment P11 (11 kD) appeared at 100 micromol/L and was increased at 400 micromol/L. CONCLUSION: Resveratrol inhibits the proliferation of synoviocytes and induces cell apoptosis in rheumatoid arthritis in vitro, which may relate to the activation of caspase-3.