Study of the radio-protective effect of cuttlefish ink on hemopoietic injury.

Irradiation leads to immunosuppression, hemopoiesis injury as well as sub-health of human being. The protective and therapeutic effects of cuttlefish ink on hemopoiesis in 60Co gamma radiated model mice were investigated. One hundred and twenty female ICR mice aged 6 weeks (20-24g) were randomly divided into five groups: the control group, the model group, and the low, medium, high dosage groups. The mice in different groups were orally administered normal solution (N.S.) or cuttlefish ink of different dosage daily for 40 days. Hemopoiesis impaired model was induced by 60Co gamma irradiating with lethal dose of 8.0 Gy. The number of bone marrow nucleated cells (BMNC), colony-forming unit in spleen (CFU-S), colony-forming unit of granulocyte and monocyte (CFU-GM), peripheral blood pictures and superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity in serum have been measured. Compared with model group, the decrease of BMNC, CFU-S, CFU-GM, peripheral leukocytes and SOD activity in serum in 60Co gamma irradiated mice of cuttlefish ink feeding groups were resisted significantly (p<0.05 or p<0.01). Moreover, the restoration of those indices was promoted significantly (p<0.05 or p<0.01). The cuttlefish ink showed no significant effect on peripheral erythrocytes, thrombocytes and hemoglobin. The results showed that cuttlefish ink had significant effects on granulopoiesis. The mechanism underlining these effects may be that the increase of antioxidant level in mice, the improvement of bone marrow haematopoietic microenvironment and the inducement of cellular factors promoted the proliferation and differentiation of CFU-S and CFU-GM and thus enhance the defensive system of organism.