Abstract
High‐intensity interval (HII) exercise elicits distinct vascular responses compared to a matched dose of moderate intensity continuous (MOD) exercise. However, the acute effects of HII compared to MOD exercise on arterial stiffness are incompletely understood. Circulating microRNAs (ci‐miRs) may contribute to the vascular effects of exercise. We sought to determine exercise intensity‐dependent changes in ci‐miR potentially underlying changes in arterial stiffness. Ten young, healthy men underwent well‐matched, 30‐min HII and MOD exercise bouts. RT‐qPCR was used to determine the levels of seven vascular‐related ci‐miRs in serum obtained immediately before and after exercise. Arterial stiffness measures including carotid to femoral pulse wave velocity (cf‐PWV), carotid arterial compliance and β‐stiffness, and augmentation index (AIx and AIx75) were taken before, 10min after and 60min after exercise. Ci‐miR‐21‐5p, 126‐3p, 126‐5p, 150‐5p, 155‐5p, and 181b‐5p increased after HII exercise (p < .05), while ci‐miR‐150‐5p and 221‐3p increased after MOD exercise (p = .03 and 0.056). One hour after HII exercise, cf‐PWV trended toward being lower compared to baseline (p = .056) and was significantly lower compared to 60min after MOD exercise (p = .04). Carotid arterial compliance was increased 60min after HII exercise (p = .049) and was greater than 60min after MOD exercise (p = .02). AIx75 increased 10 min after both HII and MOD exercise (p < .05). There were significant correlations between some of the exercise‐induced changes in individual ci‐miRs and changes in cf‐PWV and AIx/AIx75. These results support the hypotheses that arterial stiffness and ci‐miRs are altered in an exercise intensity‐dependent manner, and ci‐miRs may contribute to changes in arterial stiffness.
Highlights
Increased stiffening of the large arteries occurs with aging and contributes to the development of cardiovascular disease (CVD) (Shirwany & Zou, 2010)
We hypothesized that High-intensity interval (HII) exercise would elicit greater changes in Circulating microRNAs (ci-miRs) and arterial stiffness compared with a matched bout of moderate intensity continuous exercise, and that the responses of these variables would be significantly correlated
At 60 min post-exercise, contrasts revealed a decrease in carotid to femoral pulse wave velocity (cf-PWV) after HII exercise compared to baseline that approached statistical significance (p = .056), and was significantly different compared to the value 60 min after moderate intensity continuous (MOD) exercise (p = .04)
Summary
Increased stiffening of the large arteries occurs with aging and contributes to the development of cardiovascular disease (CVD) (Shirwany & Zou, 2010). High-intensity endurance exercise results in greater and unique changes in many of these stimuli, which are proposed to explain the larger impairment in endothelial function often observed immediately after higher intensity compared to low-moderate intensity exercise (Antunes et al, 2019; Birk et al, 2013; Dawson et al, 2013,; Johnson, Mather, Newcomer, Mickleborough, & Wallace, 2012; McClean, Harris, Brown, Brown, & Davison, 2015; Peake et al, 2005) It is less clear whether there are exercise intensity-dependent changes in arterial stiffness and what factors may potentially contribute to such differences (Mutter et al, 2017; Pierce et al, 2018). We hypothesized that HII exercise would elicit greater changes in ci-miRs and arterial stiffness compared with a matched bout of moderate intensity continuous exercise, and that the responses of these variables would be significantly correlated
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