Role of hydrogen sulphide in ischemic disease: possible interactions with carbon monoxide

Abstract

The role and possible interactions of hydrogen sulphide (H2S) with carbon monoxide (CO) in ischemic disease has not been previously studied. Thus we investigated whether H2S works synergistically with CO in the amelioration of myocardial infarction (MI) in vitro with a hypoxic environment. From the cell viability data, it was shown that cell death was eradicated with pretreatment of NaHS (54.0B10.8%) or CORM-2 (55.0B10.8%) individually. Interestingly, the cell viability improved several folds when both NaHS and CORM-2 (91.2B11.6%) were administered (P<0.05 compared to HC). The cell viability test was correlated to the lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) assay, H2S assay, cystathionine-gamma-lyase (CSE) activity, heme oxygenase (HO) activity and immunohistochemical staining. As for reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) on CSE and HO-1 genes, the mRNA level in the NaHS and CORM-2 pretreatment group was several folds higher compared to NaHS or CORM-2 only pretreated groups.