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. 2012 Oct 15;7(29):2259-66.
doi: 10.3969/j.issn.1673-5374.2012.29.003.

Role of inflammatory cytokines in peripheral nerve injury

Federica Fregnan  1 , Luisa Muratori  1 , Anabel Rodriguez Simões  2 , Maria Giuseppina Giacobini-Robecchi  2 , Stefania Raimondo  1
Affiliations

Role of inflammatory cytokines in peripheral nerve injury

Federica Fregnan et al. Neural Regen Res. .

Abstract

Inflammatory events occurring in the distal part of an injured peripheral nerve have, nowadays, a great resonance. Investigating the timing of action of the several cytokines in the important stages of Wallerian degeneration helps to understand the regenerative process and design pharmacologic intervention that promotes and expedites recovery. The complex and synergistic action of inflammatory cytokines finally promotes axonal regeneration. Cytokines can be divided into pro- and anti-inflammatory cytokines that upregulate and downregulate, respectively, the production of inflammatory mediators. While pro-inflammatory cytokines are expressed in the first phase of Wallerian degeneration and promote the recruitment of macrophages, anti-inflammatory cytokines are expressed after this recruitment and downregulate the production of all cytokines, thus determining the end of the process. In this review, we describe the major inflammatory cytokines involved in Wallerian degeneration and the early phases of nerve regeneration. In particular, we focus on interleukin-1, interleukin-2, interleukin-6, tumor necrosis factor-β, interleukin-10 and transforming growth factor-β.

Keywords: Schwann cells; anti-inflammatory cytokines; axonal regeneration; inflammatory reaction; macrophage; myelin; nerve injury; neural regeneration; peripheral nervous system; pro-inflammatory cytokines; wallerian degeneration.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of interest: None declared.

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