Growth retardation in senescent arterial smooth muscle cells and its reversal following brain stimulation:...

Advancing age and psychosocial stress are each associated with a rising incidence of atherosclerosis. In this investigation we attempted to answer the question of whether they are independent of each other or not. Since a key feature of atherosclerosis is the proliferation of arterial smooth muscle cells (ASMC), we transplanted aortic tissue from aged rats, half of which had received hypothalamic stimulation, as a model for stress, to growth supporting medium, immediately after stimulation and observed their growth behavior for a period of 4 months. Similar observations were carried out on young animals for comparison. Although there was little difference in outgrowth frequency of explants from young animals between stimulated and non-stimulated subjects, in the case of the older rats, explants from animals which were not stimulated were considerably retarded in their growth, whereas those from subjects which had received HS, grew as well as those of the younger ones. These results show that HS can reverse the growth decline in aortic tissues explanted from senescent rats. They also suggest that age per se is not atherogenic in terms of proliferative behavior of ASMC, whereas when interacted with a stressful condition, this may be the case. Since in the elderly there is a decreased tolerance to stress, the 'atherogenic' effects of age in these individuals may be mediated through the stress response.