| Summary: | <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The possible participation of diesel exhaust inhalation during the fetal period in the elevation of IgE against pollen in postnatal life was investigated.</p> <p>Method</p> <p>The experiment was conducted using rat pups. Group I; exposed to clean air (<it>Control</it>). Group 2, 3; exposed to total or filtered diesel exhaust during the fetal period (<it>Total-C-C, Filtered-C-C</it>). Group 4, 5; exposed to total or filtered diesel exhaust during the suckling period (<it>C-Total-C, C-Filtered-C</it>). Group 6,7; exposed to total or filtered diesel exhaust during the weaning period (<it>C-C-Total, C-C-Filtered</it>). Total diesel engine exhaust contained 1.73 mg/m<sup>3</sup> particulate matter and 0.79 ppm nitrogen dioxide; filtered exhaust contained the same gases as the total exhaust without particulate matter. Intraperitoneal injection of 5 mg crude cedar pollen was performed at 2-week intervals from the 49th day after birth.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The mean IgE titers measured by the P-K reaction in the <it>Control, Total-C-C, Filtered-C-C, C-Total-C, C-Filtered-C, C-C-Total</it> and <it>C-C-Filtered</it> were 64.0 ± 2.7, 469.5 ± 1.6, 332.0 ± 1.7, 380.4 ± 1.7, 394.8 ± 1.7, 115.9 ± 1.3 and 57.0 ± 2.8 respectively after the fourth immunization. There were significant differences between <it>Total-C-C, Filtered-C-C, C-Total-C, C-Filtered-C</it> and <it>Control</it> (p < 0.01, p < 0.01, p < 0.05, p < 0.01, respectively). The mean IgE titers by ELISA were 0.47 ± 0.06, 0.79 ± 0.35, 0.86 ± 0.46, 0.80 ± 0.22, 0.56 ± 0.08, 0.46 ± 0.04 and 0.45 ± 0.03, respectively. IgE titers in <it>Filtered-C-C</it> and C-Total-C were significantly higher than in <it>Control</it> (p < 0.05 for each).</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Inhalation of diesel exhaust during differentiation of the immune system accelerated the elevation of IgE against pollen.</p>
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