Expression of protein kinase c isoforms during cardiac ventricular development. Clerk, Angela, Marie A. Bogoyevitch, Stephen J. Fuller, Antigone Lazou, Peter J. Parker, and Peter H. Sugden. Department of Cardiac Medicine, National Heart and Lung Institute, University of London, London SW3 6LY, United Kingdom; and Imperial Cancer Research Fund Laboratories, London WC2A 3PX, United Kingdom
APStracts 2:0091H, 1995.
The expression of protein kinase C (PKC) isoforms (PKC-[alpha], PKC -[beta]1, PKC-[delta], PKC- and PKC-_) was studied by immunoblotting in whole ventricles of rat hearts during post-natal development (1 - 26 days) and in the adult. PKC-[alpha], PKC-[beta]1, PKC-[delta], PKC- and PKC-_ were detected in ventricles of 1-day-old rats, although PKC-[alpha] and PKC[beta]1 were only barely detectable. All isoforms were rapidly down-regulated during development, with abundances relative to total protein declining in the adult to <25% of 1-day-old values. PKC-[beta]1 was not detectable in adult ventricles. The specific activity of PKC was also down-regulated. The rat ventricular myocyte becomes amitotic soon after birth but continues to grow, increasing its protein content 40- to 50-fold between the neonate and the 300 g adult. An important question is thus whether the amount of PKC per myocyte is down-regulated. Using isolated cells, immunoblotting showed that the contents per myocyte of PKC-[alpha] and PKC- increased about 10-fold between the neonatal and adult stages. In rat ventricles, the rank of association with the particulate fraction was PKC-[delta]>PKC- >PKC-_. Association of these isoforms with the particulate fraction was less in the adult than in the neonate. In primary cultures of ventricular myocytes prepared from neonatal rat hearts, 1 [mu]M 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol 13-acetate (TPA) elicited translocation of PKC-[alpha], PKC-[delta] and PKC- from the soluble to the particulate fraction in <1 min, after which time no further translocation was observed. Prolonged exposure (16 h) of myocytes to 1 [mu]M TPA caused essentially complete down-regulation of these isoforms, although down-regulation of PKC- was slower than for PKC-[delta]. In contrast, PKC-_ was neither translocated nor down-regulated by 1 [mu]M TPA. Immunoblotting of human ventricular samples also revealed down -regulation of PKC relative to total protein during fetal/postnatal development.

Received 16 May 1994; accepted in final form 1 March 1995.
APS Manuscript Number H415-4.
Article publication pending Am. J. Physiol. (Heart Circ. Physiology).
ISSN 1080-4757 Copyright 1995 The American Physiological Society.
Published in APStracts on 21 March 1995.