Black Cumin Inhibits Pro-Atherogenic Changes and Reduces Aortic Intima Media Thickness in Rats with Sub-Chronical Cigarette Smoke Exposure

The study aims to explore the association between black cumin extract supplementation to endothelial dysfunction markers and aortic Intima Media Thickness (IMT) in rats with sub-chronical cigarette smoke exposure. Fifty Wistar rats (Rattus norvegicus) were classified into five kind of groups: negative control group (NC); positive control group (PC), which was shown up to 40 cigarettes/day for about 4 weeks; and three groups shown up to cigarette smoke and it has administration of extract of black cumin ethanolic for about four weeks but in different amount of doses: 0.3 g/kg/day (T1); 0.6 g/kg/day (T2); and 1.2 g/kg/day (T3). After getting intervented, aorta was examined to measure the level of vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 (VCAM-1), endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS), and also IMT. The dominant active substances of black cumin are linoleic acid (71.31%), palmitate acid (15.86%), stearate (4.69%), octadicadienal (3.8%), beta monolinolein (1.8%), and thymoquinone (0.28%). eNOS level significantly increased in T1 compared to PC with p=0.001. A significant descending in VCAM-1 was found in T2 (p=0.014) and T3 (p=0.044) compared to PC. Aortic IMT decreased significantly in T1 (p=0.009), T2 (p=0.000), and also T3 (p=0.043) than the PC. Increased eNOS, decreased VCAM-1 and IMT following black cumin extract supplementation showed that black cumin may prevent endothelial dysfunction.