Strain‐Dependent Differences in Inflammatory/Immune Activity in Cutaneous Wound Tissue Repair in Rats: The Significance of Body Mass/Proneness to Obesity

Inflammatory/immune cells and mediators are substantial for wound healing because they orchestrate biological activities in this complex process. Among factors that affect wound healing, obesity, and metabolic diseases are among the most significant, particularly because of a relationship between obesity and a prediabetic state with immune reactivity. Using Dark Agouti (DA) and Albino Oxford (AO) rats, which differ in immune responses as well as in proneness to obesity, we examined the impact of these intrinsic factors on cutaneous wound healing. Dynamics of the process were monitored at days 3, 5, and 7 post-wounding parallel in both rat strains by analysis of selected basic aspects of the wound repair process (cytokine and growth factor responses) in granulation tissue. Strain-related differences in the extent of reduction of the wound area were shown, which coincided with differential proinflammatory and immune-regulatory cytokines, as well as growth factors response in these rats. Some of these differences seem related to their dissimilarities in the proneness to obesity. Results in this study extended so far known differences in inflammatory/immune responses to a variety of stimuli between AO and DA rats and showed, for the first time, immune-based differences in wound healing between rats that differ in body mass (BM) and obesity proneness (under ad libitum feeding conditions with normal rodent chow).