title: Correlation of heat shock protein expression to gender difference in development of stress-induced gastric mucosal injury in rats.
abstract: Recent studies have indicated that heat shock proteins (HSPs), which function as molecular chaperones, play important roles in cellular responses to stress-related events. However, the gender difference in the expression of HSP in the gastric mucosa remains unclear. In order to understand the mechanism of gender difference in the prevalence or severity of gastric mucosal lesions, the expression level of HSP and the correlation of estrogen to HSP induction in the gastric mucosa were evaluated in this study. The basal expression levels of HSP60 and HSP90 in the gastric mucosa were significantly higher in females than those in males. The gastric ulcer index was significantly higher in male rats compared to female rats observed after 12 h water immersion stress exposure. At this time point, the expression levels of HSP60 and HSP90 in the gastric mucosa were significantly higher in females than those in males. An estrogen-treatment significantly induced the expression of HSP60, HSP70 and HSP90 in the gastric mucosa. Inversely, an ovariectomy dramatically reduced the expression of HSP60, HSP70 and HSP90 in the gastric mucosa. Our results suggested that estrogen might play an important role in gastric mucosal protection with the induction of gastric mucosal HSPs.
authors.affiliation: Department of Gastroenterology, Juntendo University School of Medicine, Bunkyo-Ku, Tokyo 113-8421, Japan.
authors.forename: Taiji
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Takahashi
authors.forename: Michiro
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Otaka
authors.forename: Masaru
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Odashima
authors.forename: Kumiko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Tamaki
authors.forename: Makiko
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Takada
authors.forename: Yuko
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Izumi
authors.forename: Tomoyoshi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Shibuya
authors.forename: Naoto
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Sakamoto
authors.forename: Hideaki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Itoh
authors.forename: Sumio
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Watanabe