Coxsackievirus B3 infection induced viral myocarditis by regulating the expression pattern of chemokines in cardiac myocytes.

Viral myocarditis is a common cardiovascular disease, which has greatly threatened human health. However, up to now, the pathogenesis of viral myocarditis has been unclear, which leads to the lack of its effective treatments. To investigate the role of chemokines in pathogenesis of viral myocarditis, mRNA expression for a panel of 19 chemokines detected by RT-PCR in myocardial tissue of BALB/c mice that were inoculated intraperitoneally with coxsackievirus B3. Moreover primary cultured cardiac myocytes were infected with coxsackievirus B3 following extraction of RNA, from myocytes the expression of 19 chemokines was detected by by RT-PCR. Our results showed that there was much difference in the expression pattern of chemokines in myocardial tissue between infected mice with viral myocarditis and uninfected control mice. The expression of chemokines was varied significantly in clusters in myocardium post coxsackievirus B3 infection. There were also complexity and imbalance in the change of the expression of chemokines. In the meantime, Coxsackievirus B3 infection also influenced the expression pattern of chemokines in cardiac myocytes in vitro. However the expression of monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 alone was upregulated in cardiac myocytes post coxsackievirus B3 infection in the 19 detected chemokines. The chemokine expression pattern changed in complexity and imbalance manner both in myocardium and in primary cultured cardiac myocytes after coxsackievirus B3 infection. Coxsackievirus B3 infection may start viral myocarditis by regulating the expression pattern of chemokines in cardiac myocytes. MCP-1 may be one of key chemokines in the initial stage of viral myocarditis.