Background Emerging evidence showed that resistin induces vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) migration, a critical step to initiating vascular restenosis. Mechanistically, adhesion molecule expression and cytoskeletal rearrangement have been observed in this progress. Given that matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) also regulates cell migration, we hypothesized that MMPs may mediate resistin-induced VSMC migration. Materials and Methods Human VSMCs were treated with recombinant human resistin at physiological (10 ng/mL) and pathological (40 ng/mL) concentrations for 24 hours. Cell migration was determinate by Boyden chamber assay. MMP and TIMP mRNA and protein levels were measured with real-time PCR and ELISA. MMP enzymatic activity was measured by zymography on precast gels. In another experiment, neutralizing antibodies against MMP-2 and MMP-9 were co-incubated with resistin in cultured VSMCs. The regulation of MMP by protein kinase C (PKC) was determined by εV1–2, a selective PKCε inhibitor. Results Resistin-induced SMC migration was confirmed by Boyden chamber assay. 40ng/mL Resistin increased SMC migration by 3.7 fold. Molecularly, resistin stimulated MMP-2 and - MMP9 mRNA and protein expressions. In contrast, the TIMP-1 and TIMP-2 mRNA levels were inhibited by resistin. Neutralizing antibodies against MMP-2 and MMP-9 effectively reversed VSMC migration. Furthermore, resistin activated PKCε and selective PKCε inhibitor suppressed resistin-induced MMP expression, activity and cell migration. Conclusions Our study confirmed that resistin increases vascular smooth muscle cell migration in vitro. Mechanistically, resistin-stimulated cell migration was associated with increased MMP expression and activity, which was dependent on PKCε activation.

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High detection sensitivity and resolution are two critical parameters for recording good peptide mass fingerprints (PMF) of low abundance proteins. This paper reports a mass spectrometry (MS) sample preparation technique that could improve sensitivity and resolution. By coating the MS steel target with a thin layer of pentadecafluorooctamido propyltrimethoxysilane, which was both polar and nonpolar solvent repellent, the transferred sample droplets on its surface were significantly smaller. As a result, the analyte of the peptide mixture became more concentrated and homogeneous, which helped to improve the sensitivity. The advantages of a modified MS target were documented by mass spectra improvement of attomole level standard peptides and silver-stained proteins from polyacrylamide gels. The mass signal of angiotensin II at 100 attomole was difficult to record on the conventional support, whereas it was easily detected on the modified one. The PMF of cytochrome C was also better recorded on the modified support, in terms of both signal-to-noise ratio and the number of detected peptides. When silver-stained proteins from two-dimensional electrophoresis gels were analyzed, in most cases more satisfactory peptide mass spectra were obtained from the modified support. Searching protein databases with more mass data from the improved PMFs, several unknown proteins were successfully identified.

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