1. Uptake, efflux, and toxicity of inorganic and methyl mercury in the endothelial cells (EA.hy926)
- Author
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Elizabeth Lee, Josh Fowler, Martin Tsz-Ki Tsui, Zhenquan Jia, and Songnian Liu
- Subjects
0301 basic medicine ,Programmed cell death ,chemistry.chemical_element ,lcsh:Medicine ,Apoptosis ,010501 environmental sciences ,Pharmacology ,01 natural sciences ,Article ,Cell Line ,Environmental impact ,03 medical and health sciences ,chemistry.chemical_compound ,Humans ,Neurotoxin ,lcsh:Science ,Methylmercury ,0105 earth and related environmental sciences ,Multidisciplinary ,Cell Death ,Dose-Response Relationship, Drug ,Chemistry ,lcsh:R ,Endothelial Cells ,Mercury ,Methylmercury Compounds ,Mercury (element) ,030104 developmental biology ,Cytoplasm ,Mercuric Chloride ,Toxicity ,lcsh:Q ,Endothelium, Vascular ,Efflux - Abstract
Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the major cause of morbidity, mortality, and health care costs in the United States, and possibly around the world. Among the various risk factors of CVD, environmental and dietary exposures to mercury (Hg), a highly toxic metal traditionally regarded as a neurotoxin, has been recently suggested as a potential contributor towards human atherosclerotic development. In this study, we investigated the toxicity, type of cell death, dose-dependent uptake, and efflux of inorganic HgII (as HgCl2) and methylmercury or MeHg (as CH3HgCl) in EA.hy926 endothelial cells, as these two forms of Hg are often reported to be present in human blood among the general populations (~20–30% as HgII and ~70–80% as MeHg). Our results showed that HgII is more toxic than MeHg to the endothelial cells, owing to the higher uptake into the cytoplasm and perhaps importantly lower efflux of HgII by the cells, thus the “net” accumulation by the endothelial cells is higher for HgII than MeHg when exposed to the same Hg levels in the media. Furthermore, both HgII and MeHg were found to induce apoptotic and necrotic cell death. This study has important implications for the contributions of these two common Hg species to the development of atherosclerosis, an important process leading to CVD.
- Published
- 2020