Herp depletion protects from protein aggregation by up-regulating autophagy.

Herp is an endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress inducible protein that participates in the ER-associated protein degradation (ERAD) pathway. However, the contribution of Herp to other protein degradation pathways like autophagy and its connection to other types of stress responses remain unknown. Here we report that Herp regulates autophagy to clear poly-ubiquitin (poly-Ub) protein aggregates.

Cardiomyocyte ryanodine receptor degradation by chaperone-mediated autophagy.

Aims: Chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA) is a selective mechanism for the degradation of soluble cytosolic proteins bearing the sequence KFERQ. These proteins are targeted by chaperones and delivered to lysosomes where they are translocated into the lysosomal lumen and degraded via the lysosome-associated membrane protein type 2A (LAMP-2A). Mutations in LAMP2 that inhibit autophagy result in Danon disease characterized by hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.

Mitochondria, myocardial remodeling, and cardiovascular disease.

The process of muscle remodeling lies at the core of most cardiovascular diseases. Cardiac adaptation to pressure or volume overload is associated with a complex molecular change in cardiomyocytes which leads to anatomic remodeling of the heart muscle. Although adaptive at its beginnings, the sustained cardiac hypertrophic remodeling almost unavoidably ends in progressive muscle dysfunction, heart failure and ultimately death.

Energy-preserving effects of IGF-1 antagonize starvation-induced cardiac autophagy.

Aims: Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) is known to exert cardioprotective actions. However, it remains unknown if autophagy, a major adaptive response to nutritional stress, contributes to IGF-1-mediated cardioprotection.

Methods And Results: We subjected cultured neonatal rat cardiomyocytes, as well as live mice, to nutritional stress and assessed cell death and autophagic rates.

Systemic oxidative stress and endothelial dysfunction is associated with an attenuated acute vascular response to inhaled prostanoid in pulmonary artery hypertension patients.

Background: Systemic endothelial dysfunction and increased oxidative stress have been observed in pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). We evaluate whether oxidative stress and endothelial dysfunction are associated with acute pulmonary vascular bed response to an inhaled prostanoid in PAH patients.

Methods: Fourteen idiopathic PAH patients and 14 controls were included.

Glucose deprivation causes oxidative stress and stimulates aggresome formation and autophagy in cultured cardiac myocytes.

Aggresomes are dynamic structures formed when the ubiquitin-proteasome system is overwhelmed with aggregation-prone proteins. In this process, small protein aggregates are actively transported towards the microtubule-organizing center. A functional role for autophagy in the clearance of aggresomes has also been proposed.

Iron induces protection and necrosis in cultured cardiomyocytes: Role of reactive oxygen species and nitric oxide.

We investigate here the role of reactive oxygen species and nitric oxide in iron-induced cardiomyocyte hypertrophy or cell death. Cultured rat cardiomyocytes incubated with 20 microM iron (added as FeCl(3)-Na nitrilotriacetate, Fe-NTA) displayed hypertrophy features that included increased protein synthesis and cell size, plus realignment of F-actin filaments along with sarcomeres and activation of the atrial natriuretic factor gene promoter. Incubation with higher Fe-NTA concentrations (100 microM) produced cardiomyocyte death by necrosis.

Regulatory volume decrease in cardiomyocytes is modulated by calcium influx and reactive oxygen species.

We investigated the role of Ca(2+) in generating reactive oxygen species (ROS) induced by hyposmotic stress (Hypo) and its relationship to regulatory volume decrease (RVD) in cardiomyocytes. Hypo-induced increases in cytoplasmic and mitochondrial Ca(2+). Nifedipine (Nife) inhibited both Hypo-induced Ca(2+) and ROS increases.

Hyperosmotic stress activates p65/RelB NFkappaB in cultured cardiomyocytes with dichotomic actions on caspase activation and cell death.

NFkappaB is a participant in the process whereby cells adapt to stress. We have evaluated the activation of NFkappaB pathway by hyperosmotic stress in cultured cardiomyocytes and its role in the activation of caspase and cell death. Exposure of cultured rat cardiomyocytes to hyperosmotic conditions induced phosphorylation of IKKalpha/beta as well as degradation of IkappaBalpha.