Citation

Background: Stroke is a devastating and debilitating disease and is a leading cause of death worldwide, including intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) and ischemic stroke. Emerging evidence indicates that inflammatory cascades after hemorrhagic or ischemic stroke makes a great contribution to brain damage, mainly are involved in neuronal cell death, blood-brain-barrier (BBB) destruction and development of vasogenic edema. However, the features and direct effect of brain inflammation following stroke is still unknown. Methods: We adopted the ICH model by injection of collagenase and used a mouse model of transient cerebral ischemia and reperfusion. And pertussis toxin was used to create a pro-inflammatory milieu. Neurodeficits, lesion volume, production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and inflammatory factors, brain-infiltrating leukocytes and blood-brain-barrier (BBB) destruction were assessed in mice model treated with pertussis toxin or vehicle.Results: Adopting collagenase induced intracerebral hemorrhage mouse model, we show that pertussis toxin-induced systemic inflammation exacerbated neurological deficits, enlarged lesion size and brain perihematomal edema after intracerebral hemorrhage. Pertussis toxin promoted leukocyte infiltration and inflammatory cytokine release in the brain. Moreover, the integrity of the BBB was further disrupted after receiving pertussis toxin in ICH mice. Furthermore, we demonstrated that pertussis toxin increased stroke severity and enhanced brain inflammation in middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) mouse model. Conclusion: Our results suggest that pertussis toxin increases inflammatory response that exacerbates brain injury after intracerebral hemorrhage or ischemic stroke in mouse model.