Influence of exercise training on endothelial cell phenotypic heterogeneity between coronary and systemic vasculatures in hypercholesterolemic swine

Abstract

The purpose if this study was to test the hypothesis that the athero-susceptible coronary endothelium expresses higher levels of pro-oxidant and lower levels of anti-oxidant protein compared to the systemic conduit arteries, and that exercise training decreases heterogeneity of endothelial cell phenotype between coronary and systemic vessels. Fourteen male hypercholesterolemic swine exercise trained for 16–20 weeks (n=7) or remained sedentary (n=7). At sacrifice, endothelial cells were mechanically scraped from isolated segments of carotid, brachial, femoral, renal, and right coronary arteries (RCA), and p67phox, SOD1 and SOD3 protein expression were evaluated by immunoblotting. Expression of pro-oxidant (p67phox) and anti-oxidant (SOD1 and SOD3) markers in the RCA was not different compared to the carotid artery (P>.05), but was elevated compared to the renal, femoral, and brachial arteries in sedentary animals (all P<.05). In contrast, exercise trained animals exhibited increased p67phox protein expression in the RCA compared to all systemic arteries (all P<.05), whereas no differences were detected in either SOD1 or SOD3 expression throughout the vasculature (both P>.05). We conclude that exercise training is associated with decreased heterogeneity of antioxidant, but not pro-oxidant, protein expression between coronary and systemic conduit artery endothelium. P01 HL052490, T32 AR048523