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Upregulation of Rubicon promotes autosis during myocardial ischemia/reperfusion injury
Jihoon Nah, … , Beth Levine, Junichi Sadoshima
Jihoon Nah, … , Beth Levine, Junichi Sadoshima
Published May 4, 2020
Citation Information: J Clin Invest. 2020;130(6):2978-2991. https://doi.org/10.1172/JCI132366.
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Research Article Cardiology Cell biology Article has an altmetric score of 2

Upregulation of Rubicon promotes autosis during myocardial ischemia/reperfusion injury

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Abstract

Although autophagy is generally protective, uncontrolled or excessive activation of autophagy can be detrimental. However, it is often difficult to distinguish death by autophagy from death with autophagy, and whether autophagy contributes to death in cardiomyocytes (CMs) is still controversial. Excessive activation of autophagy induces a morphologically and biochemically defined form of cell death termed autosis. Whether autosis is involved in tissue injury induced under pathologically relevant conditions is poorly understood. In the present study, myocardial ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) induced autosis in CMs, as evidenced by cell death with numerous vacuoles and perinuclear spaces, and depleted intracellular membranes. Autosis was observed frequently after 6 hours of reperfusion, accompanied by upregulation of Rubicon, attenuation of autophagic flux, and marked accumulation of autophagosomes. Genetic downregulation of Rubicon inhibited autosis and reduced I/R injury, whereas stimulation of autosis during the late phase of I/R with Tat–Beclin 1 exacerbated injury. Suppression of autosis by ouabain, a cardiac glycoside, in humanized Na+,K+-ATPase–knockin mice reduced I/R injury. Taken together, these results demonstrate that autosis is significantly involved in I/R injury in the heart and triggered by dysregulated accumulation of autophagosomes due to upregulation of Rubicon.

Authors

Jihoon Nah, Peiyong Zhai, Chun-Yang Huang, Álvaro F. Fernández, Satvik Mareedu, Beth Levine, Junichi Sadoshima

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Figure 7

Cardiac tissue–specific knockout of Rubicon attenuated I/R injury and reduced autosis in the mouse heart.

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Cardiac tissue–specific knockout of Rubicon attenuated I/R injury and re...
Three-month-old WT (Rubiconfl/+ without αMHC-Cre) and cardiac tissue–specific Rubicon heterozygous knockout (rubi-cKO [hetero]) mice were subjected to 30 minutes of ischemia and 24 hours of reperfusion. Mice were subjected to TTC staining (A–C) or subjected to EM analyses (D–F). (A) Representative images of LV myocardial sections after Alcian blue and TTC staining (scale bar: 1 mm). Ratios of the infarction area to AAR (B) and AAR to total LV (C) were compared in WT and rubi-cKO mice (mean ± SEM, n = 3 WT and n = 5 rubi-cKO; **P < 0.01, unpaired Student’s t test). (D) Electron-dense mitochondria (arrows) and ballooning of the PNS are indicated (scale bars: 2 μm). Electron-dense mitochondria (E) and cells with PNS (F) were counted; mean ± SEM, n = 4; **P < 0.01 versus WT, unpaired Student’s t test; values were measured from more than 10 different areas (E) and more than 100 CM nuclei (F) per mouse. (G–I) Three-month-old WT (Rubiconfl/+ without αMHC-Cre), homozygous NaK-KI (humanized Na+,K+-ATPase–knockin with Rubiconfl/+ without αMHC-Cre), rubi-cKO (Rubiconfl/+ with αMHC-Cre), and homozygous NaK-KI/rubi-cKO (humanized Na+,K+-ATPase–knockin with Rubiconfl/+ with αMHC-Cre) mice were subjected to 30 minutes of ischemia and 24 hours of reperfusion. They received intraperitoneal injection of PBS or ouabain, as indicated in Figure 5B. (G) Hearts were subjected to TTC staining. Representative images of LV myocardial sections after Alcian blue and TTC staining (scale bar: 1 mm). Ratios of the AAR to total LV (I) and infarction area to AAR (H) were compared in WT and NaK-KI mice or rubi-cKO and NaK-KI/rubi-cKO mice with either PBS or ouabain injection (mean ± SEM; *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, 2-way ANOVA). See also Supplemental Figure 7.

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