Cigarette smoke condensate induced adhesion molecule expression and transendothelial migration of monocytes . Shen, Yamin, Vinod Rattan, Chand Sultana, and Vijay K. Kalra. Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of Southern California, School of Medicine, Los Angeles, California 90033
APStracts 2:0442H, 1995.
Cigarette smoking is clearly linked with increased incidence of atherosclerosis and cardiovascular disease. The adherence of blood monocytes to the endothelium, followed by their migration beneath the endothelium, are initiating events in the formation of foam cells, promoting atherogenesis. We show here that cigarette smoke condensate (CSC)-induced surface expression of a subset of cell adhesion molecules (CAM), ICAM-1, ELAM-1 and VCAM-1, in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) is associated with an increase in the binding activity of the transcription factor, NF-kB, to the consensus motif common to the CAM genes. Furthermore, CSC (25 _g/ml) both increases the rate of transendothelial migration of vitamin D3 -differentiated monocyte-like cells across the HUVEC monolayer by 200% and causes a 10-fold increase, approximately, in the phosphorylation of PECAM-1, an adhesion molecule located at intercellular junctions and involved in endothelial cell-cell adhesion. Our results show that CSC induced activation of protein kinase C in endothelial cells, initiates a signaling pathway leading to heightened binding of NF-kB to specific DNA sequences, in turn increasing surface expression of subset of CAMs. Further, our studies demonstrate a link between the phosphorylation of PECAM-1 and the migration of blood monocytes across vascular endothelium.

Received 27 June 1995; accepted in final form 20 September 1995.
APS Manuscript Number H587-5.
Article publication pending Am. J. Physiol. (Heart Circ. Physiology).
ISSN 1080-4757 Copyright 1995 The American Physiological Society.
Published in APStracts on 6 November 95