Upregulation of SCUBE2 expression in dyslipidemic type 2 diabetes mellitus is associated with endothelin-1

Abstract

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a major health problem for morbidity and mortality world-wide due to diabetic vascular complication. Following T2DM, dyslipidemia is known well for the main reason of vascular complication leading to atherosclerosis and impaired life expectancy in diabetes. Thus, a new prediction marker in T2DM could help prevent the progression disease despite of metabolic control. Signal peptide–CUB-EGF like containing protein 2 (SCUBE2), has been detected in vascular endothelium and was affected by cytokines. Recently, SCUBE2 was reported to increase in atherosclerotic human coronary artery, involving vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) and macrophages. The aims of this study were to examine the expression level of SCUBE2 in T2DM patients with dyslipidemia and its correlation with endothelial dysfunction marker, endothelin-1 (ET-1) in this group. This study design was cross sectional control study, recruited 28 patients diagnosed as T2DM who were found with dyslipidemia and 15 healthy control subjects. Our results showed that T2DM patients showed higher LDL cholesterol, triglycerides, and ET-1 expression level compared to healthy subjects. Further, we found that SCUBE2 had strong correlation with ET-1 in these dyslipidemic T2DM patients. In conclusion, our study confirmed first that SCUBE2 was upregulated in T2DM with dyslipidemia. Moreover, Pearson correlation analysis of ET-1 and SCUBE2 in this group showed high correlation r = 0.797, P < 0.001, suggesting that SCUBE2 may plausible target in vascular function changes in dyslipidemic T2DM. Improving our exploration of these findings may lead to uncover SCUBE2 involvement in diabetic vascular complication in T2DM.