Mice
Male BALB/c mice (7 weeks of age) were obtained from the Animal Resource
Centre (Perth, Australia). Mice were housed in micro-isolator cages at
21°C on a 12-hour day/night cycle with free access to food and water.
After four days of acclimatization, mice were randomly assigned to room
air (sham) and cigarette smoke (smoke) exposure groups with or without
daily supplementation of apocynin
(5 mg·kg-1) via
intraperitoneal (i.p.) injection.
The vehicle groups were injected with saline (solvent of apocynin). Mice
were weighed three times a week with daily monitoring. All experiments
were conducted in accordance with the Australian Code of Practice for
the Care of Experimental Animals, the ARRIVE Guidelines and with RMIT
University Animal Ethics Committee approval (Animal Ethics Application
Number 1521).