Shear stress alters pleural mesothelial cell permeability in
culture.
Waters, Christopher M., Matthew R. Glucksberg, Natacha Depaola, Julie
Chang, and James B. Grotberg.
Departments of Anesthesia and Biomedical Engineering, Northwestern
University, Chicago, IL 60611
APStracts 3:0129A, 1996.
The sliding motion of the lung against the chest wall creates a shear
stress in the pleural space which can be as high as 60 dynes/cm2
depending upon the respiration rate. Such shear stresses may affect
the mesothelial cells which line the pleural space on the lung
(visceral pleura) and chest wall (parietal pleura). When exposed to
shear stress (17 dynes/cm2) in a parallel plate flow chamber for 22
hours, rat visceral pleura mesothelial cells were not altered
morphologically and did not align in the direction of flow, in
contrast to the shape changes observed for bovine aortic endothelial
cells. Using mesothelial cells cultured on porous microcarrier beads,
we measured the permeability of the cells at different flows in a
cell-column chromatography assay. The permeabilities to sodium
fluorescein and cyanocobalamin increased from 8.2 + 1.0 and 7.8 + 0.7
x 10-5 cm/s to 22.5 + 1.2 and 21.8 + 3.0 x 10-5 cm/s, respectively,
when the flow was increased from 0.9 to 3.5 ml/min (corresponding to
average shear stresses of 4.7 to 18.4 dynes/cm2). The permeabilities
returned to baseline values when the flow was reduced. Cytochalasin D
stimulated an increase in permeability which was not augmented by a
subsequent increase in shear stress. These results suggest that the
barrier function of mesothelial cells is responsive to changes in
fluid shear stress.
Received 26 January 1995; accepted in final form 13 February
1996.
APS Manuscript Number A97-5.
Article publication pending Journal of Applied Physiology.
ISSN 1080-4757 Copyright 1996 The American Physiological Society.
Published in APStracts on 13 March 96