Ammonia induce lung tissue injury in broilers by activating NLRP3 inflammasome via Escherichia/Shigella

Abstract Respiratory tract diseases is closely related to atmosphere pollution. Ammonia is one of the harmful pollutants in the atmosphere environment, which has a great threat to human and animal respiratory tract health, but the mechanism of causing diseases is not clear. In this study, broiler lung tissue was used as a model to study the effect of high ammonia on respiratory tract diseases through the relationship between respiratory microflora, NLRP3 inflammasome and inflammatory factors. For this, we validated the occurrence of lung tissue inflammation under ammonia exposure and detected the lung tissue microbial constituent by 16S rDNA sequencing. Moreover, the relative expression levels of NLRP3, caspase-1 mRNA and the content of IL-1β, IL-6 were measured. After 7d ammonia exposure, the proportion of the phylum Proteobacteria and the genus Escherichia/Shigella in lung tissue were significantly increased, the expression levels of NLRP3 and caspase-1 mRNA were significantly increased, and the content of IL-1β in lung tissue and serum were higher than the control group. In conclusion, high ammonia induced lung tissue inflammation via increasing the proportion of Escherichia/Shigella, activating NLRP3 inflammasome and promoting IL-1β release. These findings provided a reference for the prevention and control of respiratory tract diseases in humans and animals caused by ammonia pollution.