Departamento de Inmunología, Escuela Nacional de Ciencias Biológicas, Instituto Politécnico Nacional (ENCB-IPN), Mexico City, Mexico.
Subdirección de Investigación Básica, Instituto Nacional de Cancerología (INCan), México City, Mexico.
J Immunol Res. 2019 Mar 14;2019:9678098. doi: 10.1155/2019/9678098. eCollection 2019.
Valproic acid (VPA) is widely recognized for its use in the control of epilepsy and other neurological disorders in the past 50 years. Recent evidence has shown the potential of VPA in the control of certain cancers, owed in part to its role in modulating epigenetic changes through the inhibition of histone deacetylases, affecting the expression of genes involved in the cell cycle, differentiation, and apoptosis. The direct impact of VPA in cells of the immune system has only been explored recently. In this review, we discuss the effects of VPA in the suppression of some activation mechanisms in several immune cells that lead to an anti-inflammatory response. As expected, immune cells are not exempt from the effect of VPA, as it also affects the expression of genes of the cell cycle and apoptosis through epigenetic modifications. In addition to inhibiting histone deacetylases, VPA promotes RNA interference, activates histone methyltransferases, or represses the activation of transcription factors. However, during the infectious process, the effectiveness of VPA is subject to the biological nature of the pathogen and the associated immune response; this is because VPA can promote the control or the progression of the infection. Due to its various effects, VPA is a promising alternative for the control of autoimmune diseases and hypersensitivity and needs to be further explored.
丙戊酸（VPA）在过去 50 年中被广泛用于控制癫痫和其他神经疾病。最近的证据表明，VPA 具有控制某些癌症的潜力，部分原因是它通过抑制组蛋白去乙酰化酶来调节表观遗传变化，从而影响参与细胞周期、分化和凋亡的基因的表达。VPA 对免疫系统细胞的直接影响最近才被探索到。在这篇综述中，我们讨论了 VPA 抑制几种免疫细胞中某些激活机制从而产生抗炎反应的作用。不出所料，免疫细胞也不能免受 VPA 的影响，因为它还通过表观遗传修饰影响细胞周期和凋亡基因的表达。除了抑制组蛋白去乙酰化酶，VPA 还促进 RNA 干扰、激活组蛋白甲基转移酶或抑制转录因子的激活。然而，在感染过程中，VPA 的有效性取决于病原体的生物学性质和相关的免疫反应；这是因为 VPA 可以促进感染的控制或进展。由于其多种作用，VPA 是控制自身免疫性疾病和过敏反应的有前途的替代药物，需要进一步探索。
