An improved method for exchanging troponin subunits in detergent skinned rat cardiac fiber bundles.

We describe a method for the removal of endogenous troponin (Tn) complex from bundles of detergent-treated cardiac fibers. After 70 min treatment with cTnT-cTnI most of the endogenous Tn complex was removed from fiber bundles. Complete reconstitution of the Tn complex was achieved by reconstituting with cardiac troponin C (cTnC) in fully relaxing conditions. Ca(2+)-dependent maximum force of the fibers treated with cTnT-cTnI or cTnT-cTnI(33-211), which was used to aid in the visualization of the troponin exchange, decreased to 85-90% of the force developed by fibers before the treatment. SDS-PAGE analysis of the cTnT-cTnI(33-211) and the cTnT(77-289)-cTnI(33-211) treated fiber bundles demonstrated that 70-80% of the endogenous Tn subunits were removed. After reconstitution with cTnC, approximately 80-85% of the Ca(2+)-regulated force was restored in cTnT-cTnI/cTnI(33-211) treated fibers. Our results demonstrate that by minimizing the prolonged exposure of skinned cardiac fiber bundles to rigor conditions, successful exchange of all three subunits of the Tn complex can be accomplished with minimal loss of function.     

Isolation of cardiac myofibrils and myosin light chains with in vivo levels of light chain phosphorylation.

Conditions are described for the preparation of functional myofibrils and myosin light chains from freeze-clamped beating hearts with the state of light chain phosphorylation chemically 'frozen' during the extraction procedure. Myofibrils were shown to be functionally intact by measurement of Ca2+ binding and ATPase activity. Highly purified cardiac myosin light chains could be routinely isolated from myofibrillar preparations using ethanol fractionation together with ion-exchange chromatography. Analysis of light chains for covalent phosphate indicated that basal levels of phosphorylation of the 18--20 000 dalton light chain of myosin in rabbit hearts beating in situ or in a perfusion apparatus were 0.3--0.4 mol/mol. Covalent phosphate content of the light chain fraction did not change during perfusion of hearts with 10 microM epinephrine.     

Activation of Pak1/Akt/eNOS signaling following sphingosine-1-phosphate release as part of a mechanism protecting cardiomyocytes against ischemic cell injury

We investigated whether plasma long-chain sphingoid base (LCSB) concentrations are altered by transient cardiac ischemia during percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) in humans and examined the signaling through the sphingosine-1-phosphate (S1P) cascade as a mechanism underlying the S1P cardioprotective effect in cardiac myocytes. Venous samples were collected from either the coronary sinus (n = 7) or femoral vein (n = 24) of 31 patients at 1 and 5 min and 12 h, following induction of transient myocardial ischemia during elective PCI. Coronary sinus levels of LCSB were increased by 1,072% at 1 min and 941% at 5 min (n = 7), while peripheral blood levels of LCSB were increased by 579% at 1 min, 617% at 5 min, and 436% at 12 h (n = 24). In cultured cardiac myocytes, S1P, sphingosine (SPH), and FTY720, a sphingolipid drug candidate, showed protective effects against CoCl induced hypoxia/ischemic cell injury by reducing lactate dehydrogenase activity. Twenty-five nanomolars of FTY720 significantly increased phospho-Pak1 and phospho-Akt levels by 56 and 65.6% in cells treated with this drug for 15 min. Further experiments demonstrated that FTY720 triggered nitric oxide release from cardiac myocytes is through pertussis toxin-sensitive phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase/Akt/endothelial nitric oxide synthase signaling. In ex vivo hearts, ischemic preconditioning was cardioprotective in wild-type control mice (Pak1(f/f)), but this protection appeared to be ineffective in cardiomyocyte-specific Pak1 knockout (Pak1(cko)) hearts. The present study provides the first direct evidence of the behavior of plasma sphingolipids following transient cardiac ischemia with dramatic and early increases in LCSB in humans. We also demonstrated that S1P, SPH, and FTY720 have protective effects against hypoxic/ischemic cell injury, likely a Pak1/Akt1 signaling cascade and nitric oxide release. Further study on a mouse model of cardiac specific deletion of Pak1 demonstrates a crucial role of Pak1 in cardiac protection against ischemia/reperfusion injury.     

Effects of ionic strength on calcium binding to rabbit skeletal myofibrils,thin filaments and myosin

Calcium binding by rabbit skeletal myosin, thin filaments and myofibrils was measured in solutions with and without 2 mM MgATP and with ionic strengths adjusted with KCl to 0.05, 0.10 and 0.14 M. Free Mg²⁺ was held constant at 1 mM, pH at 7.0 and temperature at 25 °C. In the presence of MgATP, the relation between free Ca²⁺ and myofibrillar bound calcium shifted to the left as ionic strength was decreased from 0.14 to 0.05 M. In the absence of MgATP, myofibrillar calcium binding was enhanced over a wide range of free Ca²⁺ concentration, but calcium binding was no longer a function of ionic strength. Similarly, calcium binding by thin filaments and myosin was unaffected by changes in ionic strength from 0.05 to 0.14 M. In view of evidence that cross-bridge connections between thick and thin filaments increase as ionic strength decreases, our results suggest that these connections enhance myofibrillar calcium binding. These results thus confirm previous data of Bremel and Weber (Bremel, R. D. and Weber, A. (1972) Nature New Biol. 238, 97–101) who first showed that nucleotide-free cross-bridge connections enhance thin filament calcium binding.     

The calcium and magnesium binding sites on cardiac troponin and their role in the regulation of myofibrillar adenosine triphosphatase

The cardiac troponin (Tn) complex, consisting of a Ca2+-binding subunit (TnC), an inhibitory subunit (TnI), and a tropomyosin-binding subunit (TnT), has been reconstituted from purified troponin subunits isolated from bovine heart muscle. The Ca2+-binding properties of cardiac Tn were determined by equilibrium dialysis using either EGTA or EDTA to regulate the free Ca2+ concentration. Cardiac Tn binds 3 mol Ca2+/mol and contains two Ca2+-binding sites with a binding constant of 3 X 10(8) M-1 and one binding site with a binding constant of 2 X 10(6) M-1. In the presence of 4 mM MgC12, the binding constant of the sites of higher affinity is reduced to 3 X 10(7) M-1, while Ca2+ binding to the site at the lower affinity is unaffected. The two high affinity Ca2+-binding sites of cardiac Tn are analogous to the two Ca2+-Mg2+ sites of skeletal Tn, while the single low affinity site is similar to the two Ca2+-specific sites of skeletal Tn (Potter, J. D., and Gergely, J. (1975) J. Biol. Chem. 250, 4625-5633). The Ca2+-binding properties of the complex of TnC and TnI (1:1 molar ratio) were similar to those of Tn. Cardiac TnC also binds 3 mol of Ca2+/mol and contains two sites with a binding constant of 1 X 10(7) M-1 and a single site with a binding constant of 2 X 10(5) M-1. Assuming competition between Mg2+ and Ca2+ for the high affinity sites of TnC and Tn, the binding constants for Mg2+ were 0.7 and 3.0 X 10(3) M-1, respectively. The Ca2+ dependence of cardiac myofibrillar ATPase activity was similar to that of an actomyosin preparation regulated by the reconstituted troponin complex. Comparison by the Ca2+-binding properties of cardiac Tn and the cardiac myofibrillar ATPase activity as a function of [Ca2+] and at millimolar [Mg2+] suggests that activation of the ATPase occurs over the same range of [Ca2+] where the Ca2+-specific site of cardiac Tn binds Ca2+.     

Quantitative comparison of sarcomeric phosphoproteomes of neonatal and adult rat hearts

Neonatal hearts respond to stress and function in an environment quite different from adult hearts. There is evidence that these functional differences not only reflect modifications in the abundance and isoforms of sarcomeric proteins but also in the modulation of sarcomeric protein phosphorylation. Yet our understanding of changes in sarcomeric protein phosphorylation in development is incomplete. In the experiments reported here, we first quantified the intact sarcomeric protein phosphorylation status between neonatal and adult rat hearts by employing comparative two-dimensional (2-D) gel electrophoresis in conjunction with phosphoprotein-specific staining. Subsequently, we measured phosphorylation changes at the peptide level by employing high-resolution linear ion trap-Fourier transform (LTQ-FT) mass spectrometry analysis of titanium dioxide-enriched phosphopeptides differentially labeled with (16)O/(18)O during in-gel digestion. We also employed Western blot analysis using phosphorylation site-specific antibodies to measure phosphorylation changes. Our data demonstrated the novel finding that phosphorylation levels of myosin-binding protein C (MyBP-C) at Ser(295) and Ser(315) as well as tropomyosin at Ser(283) increased, whereas phosphorylation levels of MyBP-C at Ser(320) and myosin light chain 2 at Ser(15) decreased in neonatal hearts compared with the same sites in adult hearts. Although our data highlight the significant challenges in understanding relations between protein phosphorylation and cardiac function, they do support the hypothesis that developmental changes in the modulation of protein are functionally significant and correlate with the prevailing physiological state.     

Functional importance of the carboxyl-terminal region of striated muscle tropomyosin

Striated muscle tropomyosin (TM) interacts with actin and the troponin complex to regulate calcium-mediated muscle contraction. Previous work by our laboratory established that alpha- and beta-TM isoforms elicit physiological differences in sarcomeric performance. Heart myofilaments containing beta-TM exhibit an increased sensitivity to calcium that is associated with a decrease in the rate of relaxation and a prolonged time of relaxation. To address whether the carboxyl-terminal, troponin T binding domain of beta-TM is responsible for these physiological alterations, we exchanged the 27 terminal amino acids of alpha-TM (amino acids 258 -284) for the corresponding region in beta-TM. Hearts of transgenic mice that express this chimeric TM protein exhibit significant decreases in their rates of contraction and relaxation when assessed by ex vivo work-performing cardiac analyses. There are increases in the time to peak pressure and a dramatic increase in end diastolic pressure. In myofilaments, this chimeric protein induces depression of maximum tension and ATPase rate, together with a significant decrease in sensitivity to calcium. Our data are the first to demonstrate that the TM isoform-specific carboxyl terminus is a critical determinant of sarcomere performance and calcium sensitivity in both the whole heart and in isolated myofilaments.     

Phosphorylation or glutamic acid substitution at protein kinase C sites on cardiac troponin I differentially depress myofilament tension and shortening velocity

There is evidence that multi-site phosphorylation of cardiac troponin I (cTnI) by protein kinase C is important in both long- and short-term regulation of cardiac function. To determine the specific functional effects of these phosphorylation sites (Ser-43, Ser-45, and Thr-144), we measured tension and sliding speed of thin filaments in reconstituted preparations in which endogenous cTnI was replaced with cTnI phosphorylated by protein kinase C-epsilon or mutated to cTnI-S43E/S45E/T144E, cTnI-S43E/S45E, or cTnI-T144E. We used detergent-skinned mouse cardiac fiber bundles to measure changes in Ca(2+)-dependence of force. Compared with controls, fibers reconstituted with phosphorylated cTnI, cTnI-S43E/S45E/T144E, or cTnI-S43E/S45E were desensitized to Ca(2+), and maximum tension was as much as 27% lower, whereas fibers reconstituted with cTnI-T144E showed no change. In the in vitro motility assay actin filaments regulated by troponin complexes containing phosphorylated cTnI or cTnI-S43E/S45E/T144E showed both a decrease in Ca(2+) sensitivity and maximum sliding speed compared with controls, whereas filaments regulated by cTnI-S43E/S45E showed only decreased maximum sliding speed and filaments regulated by cTnI-T144E demonstrated only desensitization to Ca(2+). Our results demonstrate novel site specificity of effects of PKC phosphorylation on cTnI function and emphasize the complexity of modulation of the actin-myosin interaction by specific changes in the thin filament.