Abstract:Objective:To develop an economical,convenient and effective approach to establish chronic obstructive pulmonary disease(COPD) rat model using lipopolysaccharide(LPS) infusion of the airway,cigarette exposure alone,and cigarette exposure joined with LPS infusion of the airway,respectively. Methods: The male Sprague-Dawley(SD) rats were randomly assigned into the healthy control,smoke exposure,LPS,and smoke plus LPS groups with 10 rats in each group. Ninety days later, we used hemotoxylin-eosin (HE) staining to investigate the pathological changes in the lung and bronchus,and ELISA to measure the changes in the level of interleukin-8(IL-8),tumor necrosis factor-α(TNF-α),and phospholipase A2(PLA2) in the serum and lung tissue homogenates. Results:In the smoke-LPS group,HE staining revealed that the pathological changes of the lung and bronchus were similar to those observed in human COPD. There was a remarkable increase of IL-8,TNF-α,and PLA2 in serum and pulmonary tissues as compared to the other three groups,with a statistically significant difference(P < 0.05). Conclusion:COPD rat model established by the airway infused with LPS and fumed by cigarettes is proved to be successful and better than the two other approaches.