| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH |
|
|
|
|||||||
|
|||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
1 Pharmacology, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: hans.zingg{at}mcgill.ca.
One of the classical biological actions mediated by the posterior pituitary hormone oxytocin (OT) is contraction of the uterus at parturition. Moreover, premature activation of the OT system is thought to contribute to preterm labor, a major clinical problem in obstetrical practice. However, the molecular mechanisms linking activation of the OT receptor (OTR) to myometrial contractions are not fully understood. Here we describe an in vitro system that should serve as a useful tool to study this question at a cellular level. The system consists of a collagen lattice contraction assay and two different human myometrial cell lines: a cell clone from a telomerase-immortalized human myometrial cell population (hTER-C3) as well as a cell line derived from a primary culture of human myometrial cells (M11). Using this approach, we observed that 1 nM of OT promoted an almost maximal effect on cell contraction in both cell lines tested. Furthermore, this dose-dependent OT-induced contraction was antagonized by the specific OTR antagonist OTA as well as the clinically used antagonist atosiban. This cell line-based contraction assay enables the application of molecular tools aimed at suppressing or overexpressing specific genes. It is also amenable to high-throughput testing approaches. Therefore, this system represents a powerful and improved experimental model that should facilitate the study of the molecular signal transduction pathways involved in the uterotonic actions of OT.
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
|
 |
|
  F. Conti, S. Sertic, A. Reversi, and B. Chini Intracellular trafficking of the human oxytocin receptor: evidence of receptor recycling via a Rab4/Rab5 "short cycle" Am J Physiol Endocrinol Metab, March 1, 2009; 296(3): E532 - E542. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
A. Szeto, D. A. Nation, A. J. Mendez, J. Dominguez-Bendala, L. G. Brooks, N. Schneiderman, and P. M. McCabe Oxytocin attenuates NADPH-dependent superoxide activity and IL-6 secretion in macrophages and vascular cells Am J Physiol Endocrinol Metab, December 1, 2008; 295(6): E1495 - E1501. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 G. Chevillard, A. Derjuga, D. Devost, H. H Zingg, and V. Blank Identification of interleukin-1{beta} regulated genes in uterine smooth muscle cells Reproduction, December 1, 2007; 134(6): 811 - 822. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
M. Kawamata, Y. Tonomura, T. Kimura, Y. Sugimoto, T. Yanagisawa, and K. Nishimori Oxytocin-induced phasic and tonic contractions are modulated by the contractile machinery rather than the quantity of oxytocin receptor Am J Physiol Endocrinol Metab, April 1, 2007; 292(4): E992 - E999. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH |
| Visit Other APS Journals Online |
