- 作者: Yu-Jun Lai; Chung-Lieh Hung; Ray-Ching Hong; Ya-Ming Tseng; Cheng-I Lin; Yu-Shien Ko; Cheng-Ho Tsai; Hung-I Yeh
- 中文摘要: --
- 英文摘要:
Background: Long-term heavy alcohol drinkers are prone to the development of cardiac arrhythmia. To understand the mechanisms, we evaluated the cardiac structural and electro-physiological changes in mice chronically drinking excessive alcohol.
Results: Male C57BL/6J mice were given 36% alcohol in the drinking water. Those given blank water were used as control. Twelve weeks later, the phenotypic characteristics of the heart, including gap junctions and electrical properties were examined. In the alcohol group the ventricles contained a smaller size of cardiomyocytes and a higher density of capillary networks, compared to the control. Western blots showed that, after drinking alcohol, the content of connexin43 (Cx43) protein in the left ventricle was increased by 18% (p<0.05). Consistently, immunoconfocal microscopy demonstrated that Cx43 gap junctions were up-regulated in the alcohol group with a disorganized distribution, compared to the control. Optical mapping showed that the alcohol group had a reduced conduction velocity (40 +/- 18 vs 60 +/- 7 cm/sec, p<0.05) and a higher incidence of ventricular tachyarrhythmia (62% vs 30%, p <0.05).
Conclusion: Long-term excessive alcohol intake resulted in extensive cardiac remodeling, including changes in expression and distribution of gap junctions, growth of capillary network, reduction of cardiomyocyte size, and decrease of myocardial conduction. - 中文關鍵字: --
- 英文關鍵字: alcohol; arrhythmia; remodeling; gap junctions; optical mapping