Regulation of the Human Prostacyclin Receptor Gene by the Cholesterol-responsive Sterol Response Element Binding Protein (SREBP) 1.

Abstract

Prostacyclin and its prostacyclin receptor, the IP, play essential roles in regulating haemostasis and vascular tone and have also been implicated in a range cardio-protective effects, but through largely unknown mechanisms. In this study, the influence of cholesterol on human (h)IP gene expression was investigated in cultured vascular endothelial and platelet-progenitor megakaryocytic cells. Cholesterol-depletion increased hIP mRNA, hIP promoter-directed reporter gene expression and hIP-induced cAMP generation in all cell types. Furthermore, the constitutively active SREBP1a, but not SREBP2, increased hIP mRNA and promoter-directed gene expression while deletional and mutational analysis uncovered an evolutionary conserved sterol-response element (SRE), adjacent to a known functional Sp1 element, within the core hIP promoter. Moreover, chromatin immunoprecipitation assays confirmed direct cholesterol-regulated binding of SREBP1a to this hIP promoter region in vivo, while immunofluorescence microscopy corroborated that cholesterol-depletion significantly increases hIP expression levels. In conclusion, the hIP gene is directly regulated by cholesterol-depletion that occurs through binding of SREBP1a to a functional SRE within its core promoter. Mechanistically, these data establish that cholesterol can regulate hIP expression which may, at least in part, account for the combined cardio-protective actions of low serum cholesterol through its regulation of prostacyclin receptor (IP) expression within the human vasculature.