The therapeutic potential of the antimicrobial peptide cathelicidin (Camp) administration in sepsis has been widely investigated. However, little is known about the pathophysiological roles of cathelicidin in septic cardiomyopathy. In a lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced endotoxaemic model, we found that the mRNA and protein expression of cardiac cathelicidin were induced in C57BL/6J wild-type (WT) mice upon LPS challenge, accompanied by increased circulating cathelicidin levels. We showed that this peptide was mainly derived from neutrophils and monocytes/macrophages. Camp deficiency exacerbated LPS-induced myocardial depression, while the administration of CRAMP (the mature form of mouse cathelicidin) decreased the LPS-induced mortality in a D-galactosamine hydrochloride (D-GalN)-sensitized endotoxin shock model. In vivo, LPS-treated Camp knockout mice had a significant higher protein level of myocardial and circulating tumour necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α), a major contributing factor to septic cardiomyopathy, compared to LPS-treated WT mice, while CRAMP administration inhibited LPS-induced TNF-α production in the heart and plasma in D-GalN-sensitized endotoxaemic mice. In vitro, CRAMP treatment suppressed LPS-induced Tnf-α mRNA expression in cultured neonatal mouse cardiomyocytes and reduced TNF-α secretion in the culture supernatant. The inhibitory effects of CRAMP on TNF-α production may be related to its neutralizing ability of LPS, since CRAMP application had no effects on another toll-like receptor 4 ligand paclitaxel-induced Tnf-α mRNA expression in cardiomyocytes. These findings suggest that LPS-induced cathelicidin protects the heart against myocardial depression partly through the inhibition of TNF-α production via neutralizing LPS.
Keywords: cathelicidin; lipopolysaccharide; myocardial depression; septic cardiomyopathy; tumour necrosis factor-alpha.
© 2019 John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.