Developmental differences in pulmonary eNOS expression in response to chronic hypoxia in the rat.

Chronic hypoxia (CH) increases pulmonary endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS) protein levels in adult rats but decreases eNOS protein levels in neonatal pigs. We hypothesized that this differing response to CH is due to developmental rather than species differences. Adult and neonatal rats were placed in either hypobaric hypoxia or normoxia for 2 wk. At that time, body weight, hematocrit, plasma nitrite/nitrate (NOx(-)), and right ventricular and total ventricular heart weights were measured. Percent pulmonary arterial wall area of 20-50 and 51-100 microm arteries were also determined. Total lung protein extracts were assayed for eNOS levels by using immunoblot analysis. Compared with their respective normoxic controls, both adult and neonatal hypoxic groups demonstrated significantly decreased body weight, elevated hematocrit, and elevated right ventricular-to-total ventricular weight ratios. Both adult and neonatal hypoxic groups also demonstrated significantly larger percent pulmonary arterial wall area compared with their respective normoxic controls. Hypoxic adult pulmonary eNOS protein and plasma NOx(-) were significantly greater than levels found in normoxic adults. In contrast, hypoxic neonatal pulmonary eNOS protein and plasma NOx(-) were significantly less compared with normoxic neonates. We conclude that there is a developmental difference in eNOS expression and nitric oxide production in response to CH.