The kidney is vulnerable to hypoxia-induced injury. One of the mechanisms underlying this phenomenon is cell apoptosis triggered by hypoxia-inducible factor-1-alpha (HIF-1α) activation. MicroRNA-210 (miR-210) is known to be induced by HIF-1α and can regulate various pathological processes, but its role in hypoxic kidney injury remains unclear. Here, in both kinds of rat systemic hypoxia and local kidney hypoxia models, we found miR-210 levels were upregulated significantly in injured kidney, especially in renal tubular cells. A similar increase was observed in hypoxia-treated human renal tubular HK-2 cells. We also verified that miR-210 can directly suppress HIF-1α expression by targeting the 3' untranslated region (UTR) of HIF-1α mRNA in HK-2 cells in severe hypoxia. Accordingly, miR-210 overexpression caused significant inhibition of the HIF-1α pathway and attenuated apoptosis caused by hypoxia, while miR-210 knockdown exerted the opposite effect. Taken together, our findings verify that miR-210 is involved in the molecular response in hypoxic kidney lesions in vivo and attenuates hypoxia-induced renal tubular cell apoptosis by targeting HIF-1α directly and suppressing HIF-1α pathway activation in vitro.
Keywords: acute kidney injury; apoptosis; cell biology; hypoxia; microRNA-210; nephrology.