Enhancement of Endothelium‐dependent Relaxation in the Aorta From Stroke‐prone Spontaneously Hypertensive Rats at Developmental Stages of Hypertension

SUMMARY 1. Endothelium‐dependent relaxation (EDR) in aortic rings from young (8 weeks) and adult (16 weeks and 20 weeks) stroke‐prone spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHRSP) was investigated in comparison with age‐matched Wistar‐Kyoto rats (WKY). 2. At 8 weeks, acetylcholine (3×10−‐9‐−10−‐5 mol/L) and ionomycin (4×10−8‐10−6 mol/L)‐induced EDR in SHRSP aortae was significantly enhanced compared to that in WKY aortae. Mechanical denudation of the endothelium completely abolished, and pretreatment of aortae with NG‐monomethyl L‐arginine (1 mmol/L), an inhibitor of nitric oxide formation, greatly reduced the relaxation in both strains. Indomethacin (10−5 mol/L), a cyclo‐oxygenase inhibitor that blocks the production of endothelium‐derived contracting factors, did not significantly alter the relaxation by acetylcholine at this age. There was no difference in endothelium‐independent relaxation of denuded aortae by sodium nitroprusside (10−9‐10−6 mol/L) and 8‐bromoguanosine 3‘, 5‘‐cyclic monophos‐phate (10−6‐10−3 mol/L). 3. In adult SHRSP with established hypertension, however, the acetylcholine (10−8‐−10−5 mol/L)‐induced relaxation markedly diminished at any of the concentrations tested compared to that observed in 8 week old SHRSP and WKY at 8–20 weeks of age. This finding differed from other observations where the relaxation in SHRSP was impaired only at higher concentrations of acetylcholine. Indomethacin pretreatment of aortae from 20 week old SHRSP restored acetylcholine‐induced EDR to a level comparable with that in age‐matched WKY. 4. These results suggest that the aorta from young SHRSP releases more endothelium‐derived relaxing factors in response to acetylcholine and ionomycin, but the relaxation greatly diminishes in adult SHRSP with established hypertension. This may be due to counteraction of endothelium‐derived contracting factors released from the endothelium with functional changes resulting from the long duration of the hypertension.