Tumor necrosis factor-α stimulation endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition during cardiac fibrosis via endothelin-1 signaling

Cardiac fibrosis is an important pathological change after myocardial infarction (MI). High concentration of tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) contributes to cardiac fibrosis, and TNF-α has been demonstrated to be involved in transforming growth factor-β1-induced endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EndMT). However, the role and molecular mechanisms of TNF-α during cardiac fibrosis remain largely unexplored. In this study, we demonstrated that TNF-α and endothelin-1 (ET-1) were upregulated in cardiac fibrosis after MI, and genes associated with EndMT were also upregulated. An in vitro model of EndMT demonstrated that TNF-α promoted EndMT by upregulation of vimentin and α-smooth muscle actin, and which strongly increased ET-1 expression. ET-1 promoted TNF-α-induced expression of gene program through phosphorylation levels of SMAD family member 2, while subsequent inhibition of ET-1 almost abolished the effect of TNF-α during the process of EndMT. In summary, these findings demonstrated that ET-1 is involved in the EndMT induced by TNF-α during cardiac fibrosis.