Reciprocal Effects of Oxidative Stress on Heme Oxygenase Expression and Activity Contributes to Reno-Vascular Abnormalities in EC-SOD Knockout Mice

Figure 2

Representative images of renal parenchyma (haematoxylin-eosin staining, 200X) in EC-SOD^(−/−) and WT mice. WT mice and WT mice treated with CoPP showed no significant morphologic alterations both in cortex (arrow’s head for proximal tubules and black point for distal tubules) and medulla (asterisk for vasa recta) ((a), (b), (e), (f)). EC-SOD^(−/−) mice displayed tubular damage, hyperproliferation in the glomerulii (red arrows) with Bowman’s capsule dilatation (red point), infiltrates (black arrows) and breakage of vasa recta in outer and inner medulla (double asterisks). ((c), (g)). Tubular interstitial and microvascular pathology are abrogated in CoPP-treated EC-SOD^(−/−) mice ((d), (h)). Western blot analysis of (i) ASK1 (j) BCL-xl protein expression in kidney of WTmic, EC-SOD^(−/−) mice, and mice treated with CoPP. Quantitative densitometry evaluation of Bcl-xl, ASK-1-to-𝛽-actin ratio was determined. Blots are representative of four separate experiments. Results are expressed as mean ± SE, *𝑃<0.05 versus WT, ⁺𝑃<0.01 versus WT + CoPP, ^‡𝑃<0.05 versus EC-SOD^(−/−).