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Prince Henrys Institute of Medical Research, Clayton, Victoria 3168, Australia
Address all correspondence and requests for reprints to: Morag Young, Endocrine Genetics, Prince Henrys Institute of Medical Research, P.O. Box 5152, Clayton, Victoria 3168, Australia. E-mail: morag.young{at}med.monash.edu.au.
| Abstract |
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| Introduction |
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The time course for these pathophysiologic effects of mineralocorticoids on the heart and coronary vessels has been studied in a number of laboratories. In studies from both Webers (5) and Roberts (6) groups, changes in collagen synthesis could not be seen before 23 wk and gradually evolved thereafter. In subsequent 4-wk studies (7), earlier changes were noted under the same experimental conditions of aldosterone/salt administration to uninephrectomized animals, with significant changes in coronary and perivascular inflammatory markers, such as ED-1, osteopontin, and cyclooxygenase (COX)-2, at the first time point measured (1 wk). In studies on deoxycorticosterone acetate (DOCA)/salt hypertension (8), inflammatory cell infiltration was seen at 48 d; whether this more rapid time course reflects the high bolus dose of DOCA, compared with the infusion of aldosterone or other methodological differences, remains to be explored.
In all of the above studies, it was assumed that the mechanisms of action of aldosterone on blood cells, blood vessels, and cardiomyocytes were at the genomic level, in that the effects were MR mediated and occurred over a relatively extended (days/weeks) time course. Recently, however, it has become clear that at least some of the acute, nongenomic effects of aldosterone are also almost certainly MR mediated, from studies from Marusics laboratory (9) on the rapid effect of aldosterone on vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) sodium-hydrogen exchange (NHE), a protein kinase C (PKC)-dependent phenomenon previously demonstrated by Wehling (10) and colleagues (11). In these studies, 110 nM aldosterone was shown to raise intracellular pH to a maximum within 5 min, an effect that was neither blocked by spironolactone nor mimicked by cortisol and consistent with an effect via a putative membrane-located, non-MR aldosterone receptor. When, however, carbenoxolone was used to block 11ß-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase activity in VSMCs, cortisol could be shown to mimic aldosterone, consistent with its effect on epithelial MR under similar circumstances. Second, the water-soluble MR antagonist RU28318, in contrast with spironolactone, completely blocked the effect of aldosterone or cortisol, again consistent with a MR-mediated rapid, nongenomic action of aldosterone. The reason spironolactone is ineffective acutely remains to be explored.
On this background, then, we determined to explore a possible role for effects of NHE-1 blockade in the uninephrectomized, 0.9% saline-drinking rat model. On the basis of our previous studies, we compared the effect of the MR antagonist potassium canrenoate with the NHE-1 blocker cariporide on the cardiac responses to a standard 20-mg dose of DOCA 8 d previously. The results of the study suggest that some, but not all, of the responses to mineralocorticoid/salt administration may represent effects of NHE-1 blockade, possibly nongenomic, which may thus play a role in triggering some of the secondary transcriptional changes responsible for the tissue damage seen.
| Materials and Methods |
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Rats were acclimated to the blood pressure-measuring device for 12 wk before surgery, with measurements made every 3 d over the course of the study. Animals were killed on study d 10; kidneys and hearts were excised, weighed, fixed in buffered paraformaldehyde for 1216 h, and then rinsed and stored overnight in PBS before paraffin embedding.
Histological analysis
Tissue blocks were sectioned in the midcoronal plane at 5-µm thickness onto glass slides and myocardial collagen levels determined by picrosirius red staining. Immunohistochemistry for inflammatory cytokines used antibodies against COX-2 (Santa Cruz Biotechnology Inc., Santa Cruz, CA), against osteopontin from the University of Iowa Hybridoma Bank (Iowa City, IA), and against ED-1 from Dr. P. Tipping (Monash University, Clayton, Australia). Sections were dewaxed by 2 x 5-min washes in xylene, and rehydrated through graded alcohol by 3 min washes with a final wash in water. They were then blocked in 0.3% H2O2 in Tris-buffered saline (TBS), and washed 3 x 5 min in TBS. For osteopontin and ED-1, a standard citrate boiling antigen retrieval procedure was used, but for COX-2 no retrieval was necessary. Sections were then washed 3 x 5 min in TBS, the primary antibody added (COX-2 1:100; osteopontin 1:10; ED-1 1:400), and sections incubated overnight at 4 C. The following day they were rinsed (3 x 5 min TBS) and the appropriate secondary antibody added at a dilution 1:200 in TBS for 1 h, followed by 3 x 5 min washes in TBS. Preincubated avidin biotin complex and filtered diaminobenzidine were applied and nuclei counterstained with hematoxylin before mounting in Depex (BDH, Poole, UK). Collagen content and level of inflammatory marker expression are expressed as percent area per field analyzed; for each marker 1012 fields were analyzed in each individual rat, the average of which was used for between-group comparisons by one-way ANOVA. Small- and medium-sized coronary arteries were scored on a scale of 03 for marker expression in vessel wall.
| Results |
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| Discussion |
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-adrenergic stimulation (15). In addition, several studies have demonstrated protection by NHE-1 blockade in myocardial ischemia (16) and postinfarction (16, 17), although whether the site of action is on cardiomyocytes, blood vessels, or both is not well established. NHE-1 expression has similarly been shown in cardiac fibroblasts (18), as has its regulation by mitogenic factors in such cells at the transcriptional level (19). In VSMCs there is not only ample evidence for NHE-1 expression but also for its regulation by aldosterone (9, 20, 21). As previously noted, Wehling (20) showed aldosterone to stimulate NHE-1 activity in VSMCs, and thus elevate intracellular pH, by a rapid, nongenomic, PKC-dependent mechanism. Subsequently Alzamora et al. (9) extended these studies, providing evidence that this rapid nongenomic effect is mediated via a classical, 11ß-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase-protected MR. Simultaneously Ebata et al. (21) reported both nongenomic and genomic actions of aldosterone on VSMCs to increase both NHE-1 activity and NHE-1 mRNA levels. This complex response makes effects observed over 8 d, as in the present series, difficult to partition between genomic and nongenomic.
The present studies were undertaken to determine whether the previously described vascular inflammatory response to mineralocorticoid/salt administration might be mediated or modulated by effects on sodium-hydrogen exchange via NHE-1. In terms of specificity, cariporide has almost two orders of magnitude lower IC50 for NHE-1 than for NHE-2 and over three orders of magnitude lower than for NHE-3 (16, 22). Although the present studies primarily address the coronary vascular effects of NHE-1 blockade, cariporide clearly blocks NHE-1 activity in other organs: The extent to which central or renal NHE-1 blockade is involved in the effect seen on blood pressure, for example, remains moot. On the other hand, the findings for the inflammatory markers ED-1, COX-2, and osteopontin can be reasonably ascribed to an effect on the vessel wall and on the processes involved in establishing an inflammatory response to MR activation.
By these criteria, the putative primary events are modestly (ED-1, osteopontin) or not at all (COX-2) antagonized by NHE-1 blockade, whereas what has often been presumed to be a secondary event (collagen deposition) in response to DOCA/salt is equivalently blocked by potassium canrenoate and cariporide. Our interpretation of these findings is as follows. First, in circumstances in which MR blockade reduces inflammatory markers to levels not different from control, their expression may be modulated by the intracellular pH of the cells involved. This is consistent with the reported action of aldosterone to increase NHE-1 expression in VSMCs (21), presumably as part of the totality of the VSMC response to MR activation. In contrast to ED-1 and osteopontin, the COX-2 response to DOCA/salt is substantially lowered by potassium canrenoate but to levels clearly well above control.
The mechanisms underlying this differential sensitivity to MR blockade are unclear. One possible explanation is of a range of downstream sensitivity to MR activation, potentially distinguishing acute nongenomic effects via PKC (10, 23), protein-protein interactions involving MR and activator protein-1 or nuclear factor
B (24), and classical transcriptional effects via pentadecamer hormone response element. Although this difference may indicate a useful direction for exploring a subcellular portfolio of responses to MR activation, elevation of COX-2 may be a bystander effect rather than a necessary link in the chain of causation of the inflammatory response. This is also suggested by the finding that COX-2 blockade (unlike MR blockade) does not block the tissue damage and vascular inflammation seen with mineralocorticoid/salt excess (Rocha, R., personal communication).
Finally, the single tissue response measured wherein cariporide and potassium canrenoate appear equivalently able to block the DOCA/salt effect is that of collagen deposition. Although this may reflect one end of the spectrum of VSMC response seen for osteopontin/ED-1/COX-2, it may also reflect involvement of cardiomyocytes/cardiac fibroblasts as well as VSMCs in perivascular and interstitial collagen accumulation. If this is the case, it would appear that, of the responses to inappropriate MR activation, those primarily driven by the vessel wall may be modulated rather than directly mediated by NHE-1 activity; in contrast, NHE-1 activity would appear crucial in mounting a putatively downstream response, that of fibrogenesis. This tentative conclusion might therefore serve as a point of departure for further studies on coronary inflammation and cardiac fibrosis in response to inappropriate MR activation, particularly in the way in which such activation may involve differential responsiveness in terms of intracellular pH and cellular redox state.
| Footnotes |
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Received January 8, 2003.
Accepted for publication April 14, 2003.
| References |
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-adrenoceptor-mediated cardiac hypertrophy. J Mol Cell Cardiol 30:763771[CrossRef][Medline]
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