Autophagy attenuates injury of human pulmonary microvascular endothe-lial cells under mimic ischemia/reperfusion microenvironment / 中国病理生理杂志

ABSTRACT

[ ABSTRACT ] AIM: To detect the autophagic changes of human pulmonary microvascular endothelial cells ( HPMVECs) under ischemia/reperfusion ( I/R) microenvironment, and to clarify the effects of autophagy on the HPM-VECs survival and endothelial barrier integrity under I/R condition.METHODS:Rapamycin ( RAP) was applied to pro-mote autophagy of HPMVECs.These cells were then incubated under the condition of oxygen-glucose deprivation/oxygen-glucose restoration ( OGD) .After exposure to OGD, the changes of autophagy, cellular death and permeability of the cells were determined by transmission electron microscopy, flow cytometry and transwell assay, respectively.RESULTS:Com-pared with the control cells, OGD-challenged cells had a much higher level of autophagy.The apoptotic rate was much higher and endothelial permeability was more serious in OGD group than those in control group.Preconditioning with RAP effectively improved OGD induced autophagy, it did not affect the cell survival and endothelial permeability under normal living condition, but obviously decreased the cells apoptotic rate, and remarkably lowered OGD-induced high permeability of the cells.CONCLUSION:Autophagy protects HPMVECs against I/R-induced injury.Promotion of autophagy is help-ful for attenuating I/R-induced cell death and sustaining the endothelial barrier integrity.