FRI141 Dietary Salt Regulates mTORC1 Signaling In Humans And Mice With Hypertension

Disclosure: H. Aljaibeji: None. D.L. Brooks: None. A.E. Garza: None. P. Gerges: None. M. Heydarpour: None. P. Luminita: None. J.S. Williams: None. G. Williams: None. J.R. Romero: None. Raptor and the mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) form a complex (mTORC1) that has been proposed to play a role in aldosterone (ALDO) production. Pharmacological inhibition of mTORC1 reduces blood pressure (BP) and ALDO levels. However, the effects of environmental factors such as dietary salt on mTORC1 in humans are unclear. We studied the impact of one-week liberal Na(+) (LIB, 200 mmol/day) and restricted (RES, 10 mmol/day) Na(+) diets on Raptor and mTOR expression in human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) from hypertensive subjects. Raptor and mTOR expression were higher on PBMCs from subjects on a LIB than on RES Na(+) diet (n=13; P=0.036 and P=0.0008, respectively). We also studied Caucasian subjects (n=792) from the Hypertensive Pathotype (HyperPATH) cohort using the Multi-Ethnic Genotyping Array on the Illumina platform. Candidate gene association analyses showed that the single nucleotide polymorphic (SNP) Raptor gene variant, rs99001846, was associated with BP and ALDO levels. Multivariate linear regression analyses performed on hypertensive and normotensive participants showed that in hypertensives, rs99001846 risk allele carriers (AA/GA), as compared to non-risk carriers (GG), were associated with increased systolic BP levels on bothLIB and RES Na(+) diets (P=0.02, P=0.01 respectively). In addition, risk allele carriers, as compared to non-risk carriers, showed increased ALDO and reduced Na(+) excretion on a LIB Na(+) diet (P=0.009, P=0.025, respectively). We also studied a mouse model of low nitric oxide and high AngII-mediated hypertension and observed increased cardiac Raptor and mTOR expression (n=4, P=0.0008 and P=0.03 respectively). We then performed in silico bioinformatic analyses of rat zona glomerulosa cells following 2 hr treatment with 100 nM angiotensin II (AngII) using the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO). AngII treatment led to the activation of mTOR signaling pathways as shown by increased expression of insulin receptor substrate type 2 (P=0.00001) and Low-density lipoprotein-related receptor 5 (P=0.03). Also, AngII reduced the expression of Eukaryotic Translation Initiation Factor 4E Binding Protein 1 by 43% (P= 0.001) and increased expression of CAP-Gly Domain Containing Linker Protein 1 by 70% (P= 0.00003) - important signaling molecules that are downstream of mTOR activation. Our results suggest that in hypertension, Na(+) intake and Raptor gene variants modify mTORC1. Thus, mTOR/Raptor expression are a potential biomarker of ALDO-mediated cardiovascular injury. Presentation: Friday, June 16, 2023