Lupus nephritis (LN) is one of the most common and severe complications in systemic lupus erythematous patients. The current treatments for LN mainly rely on glucocorticoids and other immunosuppressants. These drugs are partially effective and yet have considerable side effects, especially for long-term administration. Thus, new therapeutic approaches are clinically warranted for disease control. It has been shown that renal NLRP3 inflammasome activation play a key role in the pathogenesis of LN. Because LN results from autoimmune conditions, windows of opportunity exist for improving therapy by targeting NLRP3 inflammasome and its related molecular pathways. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) has been successfully used worldwide in treating various diseases, including autoimmune and renal conditions, with tremendously low toxicity and side effects, although individual mechanisms of action responsible for each of them to render beneficial effects are mostly vague.
In this report, we demonstrated that TCM-derived pure compounds exerted reno-protective effects in LN through regulating NLRP3 inflammasome, using our recently established screening platform with cell models, covering both immune cells and intrinsic renal cells, and a spontaneous mouse model of LN. Most of these tested components have been proved as of extremely low of cytotoxicity at a cell level, although further in vivo toxicology study is required for drug development purposes in the near future.