Recently, Wei et al. showed in a trinitrobenzenesulfonic acid (TNBS) model of colitis in BALB/c mice that pretreatment with carrageenan aggravated the severity (both clinical and histological) of TNBS colitis, with a concomitant increased expression of IL-6 and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF)-α and a reduction in IL-10 (34). This evidence concerns the gene TNF and colitis.