Astaxanthin and inflammation

"…A more recent study investigated the efficacy of Astaxanthin in lipopolysaccharide-induced inflammation of a rat’s eye (Ohgami et al., 2003), a study briefly discussed in the eye health section.

Lipopolysaccharide is a natural compound characteristic to the bacterial cell wall, and in this study, it induced uveitis, a specific inflammation of the eye characterized by the release of cytokines (soluble molecules that mediate cell-to-cell interactions) such as necrosis factors and interleukins, as well as inflammatory mediators including nitric oxide (NO) and prostaglandin E2, that are synthesized by inducible NO synthase.

Astaxanthin suppressed the development of uveitis in a dose-dependent fashion. In addition, investigation of this inflammation in a mouse macrophage cell line showed that Astaxanthin decreased NO production, inducible NO synthase activity, and prostaglandin E2 and tumor necrosis factor-_ production in vitro in a dose-dependent fashion.

These results were confirmed in a more extensive work (Suzuki et al., 2005), described in the eye health section of this review. In both studies, the researchers concluded that Astaxanthin reduces ocular inflammation by downregulating pro-inflammatory factors and by inhibiting the nuclear factor (NF)-kappaB)-dependent signaling pathway…"