ABSTRACT
Objective To elucidate the characteristics of vascular remodeling in pregnant hypertensive rats.Methods Pregnant rats were induced by L-nitro-arginine methylester (L-NAME) to build hypertension models and normal pregnant rats were used as control.Using a programmable sphygmomanometer,the blood pressure was recorded with the tail-cuff method to ensure the hypertension model was successfully replicated.The changes of mean shear stress were determined after the blood viscosity,the average blood flow and the inner diameter in left common carotid artery were measured.To analyze the degree of arterial remodeling,the protein expression levels of collagen Ⅰ (Col Ⅰ) and Ⅲ (Col Ⅲ) were detected by Western blotting,and the media thickness,the inner diameter,the opening angel both in thoracic aorta and carotid artery were determined.Results The mean shear stress of common carotid artery was reduced by (28.52 ± 3.08) ％ with the blood viscosity increasing and the average blood flow decreasing in pregnant hypertensive rats.Compared with control groups,the ratio of media thickness and inner diameter significantly increased in thoracic aorta and carotid artery,while the opening angel decreased in carotid artery and increased in thoracic aorta.With the expression of Col Ⅰ decreasing and Col Ⅲ increasing,the ratio of Col Ⅰ and Col Ⅲ went an apparent decline.Conclusions The mean shear stress is descending in pregnant hypertensive rat,with the remodeling of thoracic aorta and carotid artery.These results may provide new experimental references for further illustrating pathogenesis of pregnant hypertension.
ABSTRACT
Objective To screen out the PI3K/Akt pathway related genes in vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) subjected to cyclic strain. Method VSMCs of rat aorta were subjected to cyclic strain (10 %, 1 Hz) by using a FX-4000T system. Phosphorylation of Akt was examined by Western blotting. Suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) method was employed to analyze the differently expressed cDNA sequence between the strained VSMCs pretreated with and without wortmannin, a specific inhibitor of PI3K. These fragments were ligated with T vectors, screened through the blue-white screening system to establish cDNA library, and was sequenced and analyzed in GenBank with BLASTN search.Result Level of Akt phosphorylation of VSMCs was significantly enhanced by the mechanical strain compared with the control. Ten different expressed sequence tags (EST) were gained after sequencing 30 clones randomly selected from 54 white clones. There may be six genes related with the mechanical strain and cell signal PI3K/Akt, such as High mobility group box 1 (HMGB1), Neural precursor cells expressed (Nedd4a), Cyclin-dependent kinase 5 (CDK5), Histone deacetylase 3 (HDAC3), Ubiquitin-like 1 (Uble1a) and Heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein H1 (hnRNP). Conclusion SSH is an effective and reliable approach to screen out the genes related with the mechanical strain and PI3K/Akt pathway in VSMCs.
ABSTRACT
The results obtained were as follows:It was found that the orchidectomi-zed animals had a significantlyhigher TNC count per thymus.Inaddition,thymus weight was increa-sed and tymocytes,peripheral WBCand lymphocytes counts were elevatedin orchidectomized mice,comparedwith sham-operafed animals.