Expression of voltage-gated potassium channel gene of pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells in COPD merge chronic hypoxic patients

AIM: To study the change of expressions of Kv1.2, Kv1.3, Kv1.5, Kv2.1, Kv3.1 genes in pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells (PASMCs) on COPD merge chronic hypoxic patients. METHODS: Human lung tissue was collected from surgical patients. RT-PCR technique was used to study the expression of Kv1.2, Kv1.3, Kv1.5, Kv2.1 and Kv3.1 genes. PASMCs were divided into two groups: ① PASMCs from normal human pulmonary artery, pure COPD patients and COPD merger chronic hypoxic patients pulmonary artery； ② Cultured PASMCs exposed to continual chronic hypoxia or normoxia. RESULTS: ① The expression of Kv1.2, Kv1.3, Kv1.5, Kv2.1, Kv3.1 encoding genes were found in human PASMCs exposed to either normixa or chronic hypoxia. ② The expression of Kv1.2, Kv1.5, Kv2.1 genes in PASMCs exposed to chronic hypoxia were significantly decreased compared with control groups (P<0.05). ③ The expression of Kv1.3, Kv3.1 genes in PASMCs exposed to chronic hypoxia showed no significant change compared with control groups (P>0.05). ④ The expression of Kv1.2, Kv1.5, Kv2.1, Kv3.1 genes in pure COPD patients were significantly increased compared with control groups (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: ①The results suggested that Kv1.2, Kv1.5, Kv2.1 genes may be oxygen sensitive gene. Their expressions are affected by chronic hypoxia, which probably play an important role in human pulmonary artery hypertension. ② Kv1.3, Kv3.1 genes may not be oxygen sensitive gene and their expression are not affected by chronic hypoxia, which might play a secondary role in human pulmonary artery hypertension.