The effect of 12 weeks swimming training and royal jelly consumption on the expression JNK and AP-1 genes of lung tissue in mice with lung cancer

Background and Purpose: Lung cancer is one of the most important causes of global mortality in the field of public health. Oxidative stress and inflammatory factors play an important role in the occurrence and development of lung cancer. It is possible that sports activity along with taking anti-inflammatory supplements can be effective in improving lung cancer by reducing oxidative stress and inflammatory factors, although this issue is not well known. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of 12 weeks swimming training and royal jelly consumption on the expression of JNK and activator protein 1 (AP-1) genes in mice with Benzo[a]pyrene -induced lung cancer.
Material and Methods: In this experimental study, 36 male Balb/c mice, aged 8 to 10 weeks and weigh 18 to 25 g were randomly assigned to 6 groups: they were randomly divided into 6 groups: healthy control (n=6), sham (n=6), and experimental (n=24). Then, after cancer induction by injection of 100 mg/kg body weight of benzopyrene, the mice in the experimental group were divided into four subgroups: lung cancer (n=6), swimming training (n=6), royal jelly (n=6), and training + royal jelly (n=6). Swimming training was performed three times a week for 12 weeks. Royal jelly was also injected intraperitoneally at a dose of 100 mg/kg of body weight daily for 12 weeks. 48 hours after the last training session, JNK and AP-1 gene expression was measured using Real-Time PCR. The analyses were conducted by using IBM SPSS Statistics version 22.0. To analyze the data, a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) test with Tukey post hoc tests and two-way ANOVA with Bonferroni post hoc tests were used.
Results: Study data revealed that the expression of JNK and AP-1 genes in the lung tissue of mice in the lung cancer group was significantly increased compared to the healthy control group (p=0.001). Although the expression of JNK and AP-1genes were lower in the royal jelly group compared to the lung cancer group (p=0.044, p=0.007, respectively), but no significant differences were observed in the expression of these two genes between, swimming training group and lung cancer group (p=0.056, p=0.18, respectively). Finally, our result indicated that training + royal jelly group had the greatest decrease in expression of JNK and AP-1genes compared to the cancer group (Both of them p=0.001).
Conclusion: According to the study results, it seems that swimming training along with the consumption of royal jelly has more inhibitory and protective effects on the expression of JNK and AP-1 genes in lung tissue compared to each of these interventions alone in samples with lung cancer. To generalize the results to human samples, more studies especially practical studies are needed.