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ISSN 0582-9879                                        ACTA BIOCHIMICA et BIOPHYSICA SINICA 2002, 34(2): 138-142                                     CN 31-1300/Q

Mouse Restin Inhibits Bovine Aortic Endothelial Cell Proliferation and Causes Cell Apoptosis

XU Ren,  XIN Li,  FAN Yi1,  MENG Hai-Rong,  LI Zai-Ping,  GAN Ren-Bao*

( Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology,  Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences,  the Chinese Academy of Science,

Shanghai 200031,  China;  1Shanghai  University of Traditional Chinese Medicine,  Shanghai 200032,  China )

Abstract    Restin,  a homologous protein of endostatin,  was found by Ramchandran et al.  It was the C-terminal fragment of type XV collagen.  To analysis the inhibition activity of mouse restin on the proliferation of endothelial cells,  the cDNA of restin was amplified from the total RNA of the mouse muscle and cloned into the prokaryotic expression plasmid pQE32.  The recombinant protein was expressed in inclusion body with a yield about 60%-70% of total protein.  After refolding,  the purified recombinant protein specifically inhibits bovine aortic endothelial (BAE) cell proliferation stimulated by basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) in a dose-dependent manner,  but the activity of restin was weaker than that of endostatin.  Treatment of BAE cell with recombinant restin caused G1 arrest and apoptosis in BAE cells.  

Key words    restin;  endostatin;  collagen XV;  angiogenesis inhibitor;  apoptosis

O'Reilly et al[1] isolated endostatin,  an angiogenesis inhibitor isolated from a murine hemangioendothelioma cell line[1].  The N-terminal sequence of endostatin revealed identity to the C-terminal portion of collagen XVIII.  It consists of 185 amino acids.  Endostatin specifically inhibits endothelial proliferation and potent inhibits angiogenesis and tumor growth.  Treatment of cow pulmonary artery endothelial cell with endostatin causes apoptosis.  Systemic therapy with non-refolded precipitated protein expressed in E.coli caused regression of primary tumors[1-4].

A significantly homologous protein found by Ramchandran et al was the C-terminus 184 amino acids of mouse collagen XV alpha 1 chain.  Type XV collagen is composed of 1 363 amino acids.  It contains a highly interrupted collagenous (COL) region of 577 residues,  and noncollagenous (NC) amino- and carboxyl-terminal domain of 530 and 256 residues[5].  Type XV collagen presented in many tissues as evidenced by strong association with vascular,  neural,  mesenchymal and some epithelial basement membrane zones[6].  Ramchandran et al[] found that the recombinant C-terminus of human collagen XV (restin) could inhibit the migration of endothelial cells in vitro but had no effect on the proliferation of these cells.  In our experiments,  the result showed that recombinant mouse restin could inhibit the proliferation of endothelial cells in vivo.  Treatment of BAE cells with recombinant restin caused G0/G1 arrest and cell apoptosis.

The cDNA of C-terminus of collagen XV alpha 1 chain was amplified from total RNA of mouse muscle and was cloned into the expression plasmid pQE32.  After induction with IPTG,  the recombinant protein was expressed in inclusion body and accounted for 60%-70% of the total E.coli protein.  The recombinant protein was purified and refolded.  It inhibited BAE cell proliferation stimulated by bFGF as a dose-dependent manner.  Flow cytometry and annexin V-FITC binding assay demonstrated that treatment of BAE cell with recombinant protein caused the changes of cell cycles and cell apoptosis.

1   Materials and Methods

1.1  Reagents and materials

DMEM and Trypsin/EDTA were purchased from Gibco BRL(Rockville,  MD).  Fetal calf serum was from Hyclone (Logen UH).  Mouse was from Shanghai Animal Center.  Endostatin was prepared in our lab.  BAE cells were isolated as previously reported from bovine aortic[8].

1.2  RT-PCR

Mouse fresh muscle was homogenized in liquid nitrogen. Total RNA was isolated using Trizol reagent (Gibco BRL).  Total RNA was used as the template for cDNA synthesis using SuperscriptTM RNase H- transcriptase (Gibco BRL) according to manufacturer's instructions. PCR was performed with Ex-Taq DNA polymerase (TaKaRa) according to manufacturer's instructions. The synthetic oligo-nucleotides were obtained from Shanghai Sangon Co. Ltd. (Shanghai, China). The primers used were as follows: RT primer: 5-TTATTACTTCCTAG-TGTCTGTCATGAAAC-3, sense primer: 5-ATT-TTAAGTGCCAACTATGAGAGGCCT-3,antisense primer: 5-TTATTACTTCCTAGTGTCTGTCATG-AAAC-3, two stop codons were included in the antisense primer.  PCR product of 560 bp was amplified with this primer sets.  Reaction was incubated in PE480 thermal cycler (Perkin-Elmers,  NJ) for 35 cycles:  denaturation 30 s,  94 ;  annealing 30 s,  55 ;  extension 30 s,  72 .  PCR product was run on 1% agarose gel in TBE (10 mmol/L Tris-borate,  1 mmol/L EDTA,  pH 8.0),  and visualized by ethidium bromide staining.

1.3  Plasmid construction

The amplified cDNA fragment was ligated into Escherichia coli expression vector pQE32 (Qiagen),  resulting in the construction of an expression plasmid pQEXV.  The restin containing vector was sequenced.  

1.4  Purification and refolding of recombinant restin

pQEXV was transformed into E.coli M15 (Qiagen) and mouse restin expression was induced by 1 mmol/L IPTG.  Cells were harvested by centrifugation for 10 min at 4 000 g.  Cells were resuspended in 20 mmol/L Tris-HCl,  pH 8.0,  50 mmol/L KCl,  0.5 mmol/L EDTA,  5 mmol/L DTT and lysozyme was added to the final concentration of 0.5 g/L.  Cells were incubated at 4 for 30 min,  then were disrupted by sonic homogenizer for 10 s for ten times with 30 s interval each time.  After centrifugation at 4 ℃, 12 000 g for 30 min,  the pellet was collected and resuspended in 8 mol/L urea,  0.1 mol/L NaH2PO4,  10 mmol/L Tris-HCl,  pH 8.0. Centrifuged again as before,  the supernatant was loaded on a Ni2+-nitrilotriacetic acid-agarose column (Qiagen).  The recombinant protein was eluted from the column according to manufacturer's instructions.  To achieve refolding,  the purified protein was adjusted to pH 8.0 and DTT was added to the final concentration of 0.01 mol/L.  Following incubation at room temperature for 2 h,  the solution was added to refolding buffer (0.1 mol/L Tris-HCl,  pH 8.0,  0.5 mol/L arginine,  5 mmol/L EDTA,  1 mmol/L GSSG,  5 mmol/L GSH) with the ratio of 1200[9].  After 24 h incubation at room temperature,  the renatured protein was dialyzed against PB buffer (10 mmol/L Na2HPO4,  10 mmol/L NaH2PO4,  pH 7.2) for 24-48 h and lyophilized.

1.5  Bovine aortic endothelial cell proliferation assay

Bovine aortic endothelial cells were isolated as previously described[8] and maintained in DMEM supplemented with 10% heat-inactivated FCS and antibiotics.  Monolayer of BAE cells growing in 60 mm dish was dispersed in 0.05% trypsin solution.  Cells were resuspended with DMEM containing 2% FCS.  Approximately 3 000 cells in 200 ml were added in triplicate to each well of 96-well tissue culture plates and incubated at 37 (in 5% CO2).  Cells adhered to the plate in about 2-3 h.  The medium was replaced with 200 ml of fresh DMEM containing 2% FCS,  5 mg/L bFGF,  and samples of recombinant restin or endostatin were added to each well.  After 72 h incubation,  10 ml MTT (100 g/L) was added to each well and incubated for another 4 h at 37 ,  5% CO2.  180 μl medium was pipetted out from each well and 50 μl DMSO was added,  vortex gently to dissolve the pellet[9,  10].  The absorbency A570,  which correlates to the number of cells,  was measured with microplate reader (Model 450,  Bio-Rad).  

1.6  Cell cycle analysis

All the procedures were followed as previously reported[11].  Briefly,  BAE cells were maintained in DMEM supplemented with 10% FCS till to 60%-70% confluence.  The medium was changed with DMEM supplemented with 2% FCS containing 2 mg/L recombinant restin and bFGF was added to the final concentration of 5 mg/L.  After 24 h incubation,  cells were trypsinized and washed gently with PBS,  and then were fixed with 70% ice-cold ethanol for 30 min.  Cells were collected by centrifugation.  200 ml 1 g/L RNase was added and incubated at 37 for 30 min,  followed by staining with propidium iodide at 5 mg/L.  Cells were assessed by FACStar plus flow cytometer (Beckton-Dickinson) and the results were analyzed with CellQuest software[11].

1.7  Annexin V-FITC binding assay

Annexin V-FITC (Clontech,  Palo Alto,  CA) binding assay was performed according to manufacturer's instruction.  2.5×105 cells were plated onto a 60 mm dish in DMEM containing 2% FCS.  After 24 h incubation at 37 ,  5% CO2,  the medium was changed with DMEM supplement with 2% FCS,  5 mg/L bFGF and 2 mg/L recombinant restin.  After 24 h incubation,  cells were trypsinized and were washed in PBS and resuspended in binding buffer (10 mmol/L HEPES/NaOH,  pH 7.4,  140 mmol/L NaCl,  2.5 mmol/L CaCl2).  Annexin V-FITC was added to a final concentration of 100 mg/L,  and the cells were incubated in the dark for 10 min.  For each sample,  minimums of 10 000 cells were counted.  Data analysis was performed with standard Cell Quest software[12,  13].

2  Results

2.1  Cloning the restin gene in expression plasmids

The mouse restin gene was amplified by RT-PCR using total RNA from mouse muscle with the primers we designed.  The cDNA encodes a portion of 184 amino acids corresponding to the amino acid positions 1 132 to 1 315 of the collagen XV.  The amplified cDNA fragment was cloned into the E.coli expression vector pQE32.  DNA sequence analysis indicated that the desired plasmid had been obtained.

2.2  Purification and characterization of recombinant mouse restin

Recombinant protein mouse restin plus six histidine was expressed in E.coli and purified using Ni2+-nitrilotriacetic acid-agarose column and was refolded in vitro (Fig.1).  Under reducing condition,  recombinant restin migrated in SDS-PAGE with molecular mass of about 22 kD,  corresponding to the predicted molecular mass.

Fig.1  Recombinant production of mouse restin plus six histidine in E.coli

15% SDS-PAGE Coomassie blue staning; 1, moleculor weight marker; 2, uninduced cells; 3, induced cells; 4, soluble protein; 5, insoluble protein; 6, purified protein.

2.3  Inhibition of BAE cell proliferation with recombinant restin and mouse endostatin

His-restin and endostatin were assayed for their inhibitory activities on bovine aortic endothelial cell growth stimulated by bFGF.  As shown in Fig.2,  both endostatin and restin inhibited BAE cell proliferation in a dose-dependent manner,  but the inhibitory activity of restin was weaker than that of endostatin.  While both restin and endostatin has no inhibitory activities on fibroblast cell line Balb/c3T3 and hepatoma cell line 7404 (data not shown),  which suggested that their inhibitory activity was specific to endothelial cell.

Fig.2  Recombiant mouse restin and endostatin inhibit the proliferation of BAE cells stimulated by bFGF (n=3)

2.4  Cell cycle analysis

As shown in Fig.3,  BAE cells were treated with 2 mg/L restin overnight in 0.5% FCS. The cell cycle assay demonstrated that 50.9% of cells wasblocked in the G0/G1 after a 24 h treatment with restin, compared with 29.8% of control. The percentage of S phase cell was 31.2%, compared with 46.8% of control. These results may explain partly the anti-proliferation effect of restin on BAE cell.

Fig.3  Flow cytomery of BAE cell treatment with restin

BAE cell monolayers were exposed 24 h to restin in DMEM supplement with 2% FCS, and cells were assessed by FACStar plus flow cytometer (Decton-Dickinson). (A) control without restin. (B) cells treated with restin (2 mg/L).

2.5  Cell apoptosis detection

Annexin V,  a calcium-dependent phospholipid-binding protein with a high affinity to phosphatidylserine (PS),  was used to detect the early stage apoptosis[13].  As shown in Fig.4,  treatment with 2 mg/L recombinant restin or endostatin in 2% FCS caused BAE cell apoptosis.  At the same concentration,  the apoptosis-inducing activity of endostatin was greater than that of restin,  corresponding to the result of proliferation assay.

Fig.4  Annexin V-FITC binding assay

BAE cell were treated for 24 h with 2 mg/L restin (2) or 2 mg/L endostatin (3) or an equal volume of PBS(1). Detached cells and attached cells were collected, and phosphatidylserine externalization was mesured by labeling with FITC-labeled annexin V. The righword shift on the x axis of the restin and endostatin peaks indicates increased annexin V-FITC binding of apoptotic cells.

3  Discussion

Angiogenesis is required for tumors to grow beyond a few millimeters in size[14].  Numerous studies have shown that both primary tumor growth and metastasis is angiogenesis dependent[1].  Advantages of anti-angiogenic therapy include ease of access of drugs to the endothelial cell compartment and lessening the chance of drug resistance.  A number of angiogenesis inhibitor has been identified.  Such as angiostatin and endostatin are fragments of proteins.  Endostatin,  a 20 kD C-terminal fragment of collagen XVIII,  is a specific inhibitor of endothelial cell proliferation and migration.

Restin,  a homology protein of endostatin,  is the C-terminus of the collagen XV.  Reports by  Ramchandran et al[7] showed that the human restin could inhibited the migration of endothelial cells in vitro and angiogenesis in mouse model,  but didn't inhibit the proliferation of endothelial cells.  In this report,  we amplified the gene of 3terminus of collagen XV from mouse muscle total RNA.  The gene was cloned into pQE32 plasmid.  The recombinant protein was expressed,  purified and refolded.  The recombinant protein inhibited BAE cell growth as a dose-dependent manner.  Endostatin was reported to induce endothelial cell apoptosis[15].  We here demonstrated that mouse restin could induce BAE cell apoptosis,  too.  Cell cycle analysis of BAE cells cultivated in medium with mouse restin showed a cell arrest mainly in the G0/G1 phase.  These results correlate with the BAE cell proliferation assay described above.  There are 20 amino acids different between mouse and human restin (Fig.5),  and these difference may be the reason why the two proteins have the different biological activity.

Fig.5  The sequence alignment of mouse and human endostain, restin

The same amino acids residues are marked with capital letter.

The effects of restin and endostatin on the proliferation of BAE cells were compared.  The result demonstrated that the anti-proliferation effect of recombinant restin was weaker than that of endostatin.  Cell cycle analysis and apoptosis detection also showed the G1 arrest and cell apoptosis caused by endostatin was greater than that caused by restin.  The sequence alignment showed restin has 64% homology with endostatin (Fig.5).  This may be the reason why they have the similar activity.  Recent study demonstrated that tropomyosin was a potential modulator of the antitumor activity of endostatin.  They showed that recombinant human endostatin binds tropomyosin in vitro and to tropomyosin-associated microfilaments in a viriety of endothelial cell types[16].  Since restin is high homology with endostatin,  it may inhibit cell proliferation and induce cell apoptosis by binding to tropomyosin.  

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Received: September 7, 2001   Accepted: October 22, 2001

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