Abstract
Purpose:
An epithelial to mesenchymal transition of retinal piment epithelium (RPE) cells plays an important role in the formation of membrane in proliferative vitreoretinopathy (PVR) or scar tissue in age-related macular degeneration. Growth factors and inflammatory cytokines are involved in this process. Meanwhile prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) has a variety of strong physiological effects and is concerned with inflammation. Some articles reported that the level of PGE2 in vitreous body increases in PVR patients. In this study, we investigated that effect of PGE2 on fibrillary twitch of RPE cells by using collagen gel contraction model.
Methods:
Mouse RPE cells were prepared and incubated in three dimensional type 1 collagen gel culture system with transforming growth factor (TGF)-β2 (1ng/ml) in the absence or presence of PGE2 (0-10μM). The expression of α-smooth muscle actin and matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-3 as well as the phosphorylation of Smad2 and paxillin were examined by immunoblot analysis.
Results:
TGF-β2 significantly caused a gel contraction in RPE cells, oherwise PGE2 inhibited this effect of TGF-β2 in does dependent manner. The expression of α-smooth muscle actin as well as the phosphorylation of Smad2 and paxillin induced by TGF-β2 was also reduced by PGE2. In contrast, TGF-β2 have no effect on the expression of MMP-3.
Conclusions:
PGE2 inhibited the RPE cell mediated collagen gel contraction. This indicates that PGE2 may inhibit the contraction of proliferative membrane in progressive vitreoretinal diseases.
Keywords: 701 retinal pigment epithelium •
655 proliferative vitreoretinopathy