Captopril treatment during development alleviates mechanically induced aortic remodeling in newborn elastin knockout mice.

Captopril treatment during development alleviates mechanically induced aortic remodeling in newborn elastin knockout mice. Biomech Model Mechanobiol. 2019 Jul 03;: Authors: Kim J, Cocciolone AJ, Staiculescu MC, Mecham RP, Wagenseil JE Abstract Deposition of elastin and collagen in the aorta correlates with increases in blood pressure and flow during development, suggesting that the aorta adjusts its mechanical properties in response to hemodynamic stresses. Elastin knockout (Eln-/-) mice have high blood pressure and pathological remodeling of the aorta and die soon after birth. We hypothesized that decreasing blood pressure in Eln-/- mice during development may reduce hemodynamic stresses and alleviate pathological remodeling of the aorta. We treated Eln+/+ and Eln-/- mice with the anti-hypertensive medication captopril throughout embryonic development and then evaluated left ventricular (LV) pressure and aortic remodeling at birth. We found that captopril treatment decreased Eln-/- LV pressure to values near Eln+/+ mice and alleviated the wall thickening and changes in mechanical behavior observed in untreated Eln-/- aorta. The changes in thickness and mechanical behavior in captopril-treated Eln-/- aorta were not due to alterations in measured elastin or collagen amounts, but may have been caused by alterations in smooth muscle cell (SMC) properties. We used a constitutive model to understand how changes in stress contributions of ...
Source: Biomechanics and Modeling in Mechanobiology - Category: Biomedical Science Authors: Tags: Biomech Model Mechanobiol Source Type: research