Chemical Defence Department, CBRN Defence School, Army Engineer School, 28240-Hoyo de Manzanares, Madrid, Spain.
Chem Biol Interact. 2013 Nov 25;206(2):134-42. doi: 10.1016/j.cbi.2013.09.001. Epub 2013 Sep 11.
Chemical Warfare Agents (CWAs) are substances that can be used to kill, injure or incapacitate an enemy in warfare, but also against civilian population in terrorist attacks. Many chemical agents are able to generate free radicals and derived reactants, excitotoxicity process, or inflammation, and as consequence they can cause neurological symptoms and damage in different organs. Nowadays, taking into account that total immediate decontamination after exposure is difficult to achieve and there are not completely effective antidotes and treatments against all CWAs, we advance and propose that medical countermeasures against CWAs poisoning would benefit from a broad-spectrum multipotent molecule. Melatonin, a versatile and ubiquitous antioxidant molecule, originally discovered as a hormone synthesized mainly in the pineal gland, has low toxicity and high efficacy in reducing oxidative damage, anti-inflammatory effects by regulation of multiple cellular pathways and properties to prevent excitotoxicity, among others. The purpose of this review is to show the multiple and diverse properties of melatonin, as a pleiotropic indole derivative, and its marked potential for improving human health against the most widely used chemical weapons.
化学战剂（CWAs）是可用于在战争中杀伤、伤害或使敌人失去战斗力的物质，但也可用于恐怖袭击中针对平民人口。许多化学剂能够产生自由基和衍生反应物、兴奋性毒性过程或炎症，因此它们会导致不同器官的神经系统症状和损伤。如今，考虑到暴露后立即进行全面清除是困难的，并且针对所有 CWA 并没有完全有效的解毒剂和治疗方法，我们提出并建议，针对 CWAs 中毒的医疗对策将受益于一种广谱多效分子。褪黑素是一种多功能、无处不在的抗氧化剂分子，最初作为一种主要在松果腺中合成的激素被发现，它具有低毒性和高效性，可以减轻氧化损伤，通过调节多种细胞途径发挥抗炎作用，并具有防止兴奋性毒性的特性等。本文的目的是展示褪黑素作为一种具有多种功能的吲哚衍生物的多种和多样的特性，以及其对改善人类健康以对抗最广泛使用的化学武器的显著潜力。
