Effect of bronchoalveolar lavage fluid from patients with sarcoidosis or AIDS on interleukin 1β release from alveolar macrophages

We studied the effect of concentrated surfactant-depleted BALF from 8 normal subjects, 13 patients with sarcoidosis, and 13 patients with AIDS on IL1β release by human AM. Adherent target AM were exposed to concentrated BALF in the presence or absence of LPS (1μg/ml) for two hours. Control AM were unexposed to BALF. After an additional 24-hour incubation, AM supernatants were collected and measured for IL1β by ELISA. No spontaneous IL1β release occurred from unstimulated AM. One of the sarcoid-BALF and three of the AIDS-BALF samples induced a small amount of IL1β release from unstimulated AM. In LPS-stimulated AM, exposure to normal BALF did not significantly alter IL1β release compared to unexposed AM. Exposure to sarcoid-BALF significantly increased the release of IL1β, while exposure to AIDS-BALF significantly reduced the IL1β level in the AM supernatants. The latter effect was related to the higher mortality induced by AIDS-BALF in AM. These data show that release of IL1β from LPS-stimulated AM is modified by a short exposure to a sample of alveolar fluid from patients with lung disease.