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Mertk Reduces Blood-Spinal Cord Barrier Permeability Through the Rhoa/Rock1/P-MLC Pathway After Spinal Cord Injury

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Abstract

Disruption of the blood-spinal cord barrier (BSCB) is a critical event in the secondary injury following spinal cord injury (SCI). Mertk has been reported to play an important role in regulating inflammation and cytoskeletal dynamics. However, the specific involvement of Mertk in BSCB remains elusive. Here, we demonstrated a distinct role of Mertk in the repair of BSCB. Mertk expression is decreased in endothelial cells following SCI. Overexpression of Mertk upregulated tight junction proteins (TJs), reducing BSCB permeability and subsequently inhibiting inflammation and apoptosis. Ultimately, this led to enhanced neural regeneration and functional recovery. Further experiments revealed that the RhoA/Rock1/P-MLC pathway plays a key role in the effects of Mertk. These findings highlight the role of Mertk in promoting SCI recovery through its ability to mitigate BSCB permeability and may provide potential targets for SCI repair.

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Data and Code Availability

The datasets used in this study are available upon reasonable request from the corresponding author.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (2017A030313111) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81974329).

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Author notes

  1. Jiezhao Lin, Yuanfang Sun and Bin Xia contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Spinal Surgery, Orthopedic Medical Center, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, 510280, China

    Jiezhao Lin, Yuanfang Sun, Yihan Wang, Changnan Xie, Jinfeng Wang, Jinwei Hu & Lixin Zhu

  2. Department of Orthopedics, Chengdu Seventh People’s Hospital (Affiliated Cancer Hospital of Chengdu Medical College), Chengdu, 610299, China

    Bin Xia

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  1. Jiezhao Lin
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Correspondence to Lixin Zhu.

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Lin, J., Sun, Y., Xia, B. et al. Mertk Reduces Blood-Spinal Cord Barrier Permeability Through the Rhoa/Rock1/P-MLC Pathway After Spinal Cord Injury. Neurosci. Bull. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12264-024-01199-x

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