Abstract
Aims: With aging and stresses, the myocardium undergoes structural remodeling and often leading to fibrosis. Main Methods: To examine whether lumican, one of the class II small leucine-rich proteoglycans, has a role in cardiac remodeling and fibrosis, we analyzed the basic cardiac phenotypes of lumican-null (Lum-/-) mice in both youth and elder, and then used the isoproterenol-induced cardiac fibrosis model to study the roles of extra-cellular matrix and apoptosis in cardiac remodeling. Key Findings: Higher mortality resulted from significantly impaired systolic function, and an increase of atrial natriuretic peptide secreted by the ventricles in response to excessive stretching of myocytes of Lum-/- mice in comparison to wild type littermates. In addition, Lum-/- mice exhibited higher level of TGF-β, collagen I/III, and membrane-type matrix metalloproteinase-1 (MT1-MMP, or MMP-14) during cardiac remodeling. Significance: Our data implicates that the lumican protein plays an important role in the pathogenesis of cardiac fibrosis.
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