Protective role of a novel human erythrocyte-derived depressing factor on blood vessels in rats

The protective role of a human erythrocyte-derived depressing factor (EDDF) on blood vessels was evaluated. The experiments were carried out on 25 male Wistar rats aged 6-8 weeks, which were divided into control (n = 8), calcium overload (n = 8) and N-G-L-nitro-arginine hypertensive model groups (L-NNA, n = 9), respectively. The isolated vascular ring perfusion assay, two-photon laser scanning fluorescence microscopy (TPM) and transmitted electron microscope were used to examine the effect of EDDF on vascular function and ultrastructure. Results showed that the contractile response of calcium overload rats and L-NNA rats to phenylephrine (PE) was significantly enhanced compared with that of the control (P < 0.05), and EDDF (10(-3) g.mL(-1)) remarkably decreased the vascular contractile response of control's and calcium overload rats (P < 0.05), while EDDF had no effect on that of L-NNA rats. EDDF also alleviated the ultrastructural lesion of aorta VSMC in calcium overload rats by easing the abnormal in the nucleus, mitochondrion and other organell. It is concluded that EDDF could efficiently protect blood vessels against injury by influencing Ca2+ transport and ameliorating the lesion of VSMC, and further supported the hypothesis that the NO-cGMP pathway might contribute to the vasodilation and partially antihypertensive mechanism of EDDF.