TNF-α Mediated Increase of HIF-1α Inhibits VASP Expression, Which Reduces Alveolar-Capillary Barrier Function during Acute Lung Injury (ALI)

Acute lung injury (ALI) is an inflammatory disorder associated with reduced alveolar-capillary barrier function and increased pulmonary vascular permeability. Vasodilator-stimulated phosphoprotein (VASP) is widely associated with all types of modulations of cytoskeleton rearrangement-dependent cellular morphology and function, such as adhesion, shrinkage, and permeability. The present studies were conducted to investigate the effects and mechanisms by which tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) increases the tight junction permeability in lung tissue associated with acute lung inflammation. After incubating A549 cells for 24 hours with different concentrations (0–100 ng/mL) of TNF-α, 0.1 to 8 ng/mL TNF-α exhibited no significant effect on cell viability compared with the 0 ng/mL TNF-α group (control group). However, 10 ng/mL and 100 ng/mL TNF-α dramatically inhibited the viability of A549 cells compared with the control group (*p<0.05). Monolayer cell permeability assay results indicated that A549 cells incubated with 10 ng/mL TNF-α for 24 hours displayed significantly increased cell permeability (*p<0.05). Moreover, the inhibition of VASP expression increased the cell permeability (*p<0.05). Pretreating A549 cells with cobalt chloride (to mimic a hypoxia environment) increased protein expression level of hypoxia inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) (*p<0.05), whereas protein expression level of VASP decreased significantly (*p<0.05). In LPS-induced ALI mice, the concentrations of TNF-α in lung tissues and serum significantly increased at one hour, and the value reached a peak at four hours. Moreover, the Evans Blue absorption value of the mouse lung tissues reached a peak at four hours. The HIF-1α protein expression level in mouse lung tissues increased significantly at four hours and eight hours (**p<0.001), whereas the VASP protein expression level decreased significantly (**p<0.01). Taken together, our data demonstrate that HIF-1α acts downstream of TNF-α to inhibit VASP expression and to modulate the acute pulmonary inflammation process, and these molecules play an important role in the impairment of the alveolar-capillary barrier.