A comprehensive analysis on nonadditive transcriptional changes identifies NF-kB and IRFs as regulators of Ginsenoside Rg3 on TLR2/ TLR3 dual ligand activated macrophages

Cytokine synergy is defined as a phenomenon that while cells are actively triggered by multiple toll like receptor ligands, probably due to the co-activation of multiple pattern recognitions, cells present a supra-additive inflammatory response which could not been observed in individual ligand activated cells. The existing of cytokine synergy may result in un-controlled inflammation, so called cytokine storm, which is life-threatening in patients suffered from infectious diseases. Till now, the molecular mechanisms control the height of the cytokine synergy are not well defined, as a result, the stargates for its intervention are also limited. Ginsenoside Rg3 (designated Rg3) is a well-recognized active compound of Panax ginseng (ren shen) with various activities. In current study, we evaluated the anti-TLR2/3 inflammation effect of Rg3, focusing on the analysis of anti-cytokine synergy effect.