机构：[1]Department of Cardiology, The First People's Hospital of Kunshan Affiliated to Jiangsu University, Kunshan, China[2]Department of Cardiology, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Suzhou, China
Increasing evidence has revealed that hydrogen sulfide (H2S) has beneficial effects in the treatment of various cardiovascular diseases. However, whether H2S can attenuate the development of dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) remains unclear. In this study, we generated a rat model of DCM induced by doxorubicin and investigated the protective effects of H2S against DCM. Cardiac structure and function were analyzed by two-dimensional echocardiography. Oxidative stress was evaluated by measuring malondialdehyde, superoxide dismutase, glutathione peroxidase and reactive oxygen species. Cardiomyocyte apoptosis was assessed by flow cytometry following Annexin V/PI staining. Our results showed that exogenous administration of H2S could improve left ventricular structure and function in DCM rats. H2S was found to suppress doxorubicin-induced oxidative stress by activating the Nrf2 pathway and upregulating the expression of antioxidant proteins NQO1 and GCLM. Moreover, H2S was also found to inhibit doxorubicin-induced cardiomyocyte apoptosis by activating the PI3K/Akt signaling pathway. In conclusion, our study demonstrates that H2S protects against doxorubicin-induced DCM via attenuation of oxidative stress and apoptosis.
基金：
This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81770370, 81700737, 81400292) and the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (BK20161221).
医学