TGF-β1 (Transforming Growth Factor-β1) Plays a Pivotal Role in Cardiac Myofibroblast Arrhythmogenicity
Abstract
TGF-β1 (transforming growth factor-β1) importantly contributes to cardiac fibrosis by controlling differentiation, migration, and collagen secretion of cardiac myofibroblasts. It is still elusive, however, to which extent TGF-β1 alters the electrophysiological phenotype of myofibroblasts and cardiomyocytes and whether it affects proarrhythmic myofibroblast-cardiomyocyte crosstalk observed in vitro. Patch-clamp recordings of cultured neonatal rat ventricular myofibroblasts revealed that TGF-β1, applied for 24 to 48 hours at clinically relevant concentrations (≤2.5 ng/mL), causes substantial membrane depolarization concomitant with a several-fold increase of transmembrane currents. Transcriptome analysis revealed TGF-β1-dependent changes in 29 of 63 ion channel/pump/connexin transcripts, indicating a pleiotropic effect on the electrical phenotype of myofibroblasts. Whereas not affecting cardiomyocyte membrane potentials and cardiomyocyte-cardiomyocyte gap junctional coupling, TGF-β1 depolarized cardiomyocytes coupled to myofibroblasts by ≈20 mV and increased gap junctional coupling between myofibroblasts and cardiomyocytes >5-fold as reflected by elevated connexin 43 and consortin transcripts. TGF-β1-dependent cardiomyocyte depol...Continue Reading
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