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Specific adaptations of estrogen receptor α and β transcripts in liver and heart after endurance training in rats

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Abstract

Estrogens exert their biological roles mainly through estrogen receptors (ER) that function as ligand-activated transcription factors. ER content in a cell is regulated by many factors and is decisive for estrogen action. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the influence of an 8-wk endurance training program on ER expression in the liver, right atrium (RA), and left ventricle (LV) of intact and ovariectomized (Ovx) rats. We measured ERα and ERβ mRNA content by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). We found an important increase in ERα mRNA levels in the liver (300%; P < 0.01) and in ERβ mRNA levels in the RA (200%; P < 0.05), and a marked decrease in ERα (80%; P < 0.01) and ERβ (40%; P < 0.05) transcripts content in the LV of intact rats after endurance training. On the other hand, ERα mRNA levels were depressed by 50% (P < 0.01) in the liver, and increased by 60% (P < 0.01) in LV of Ovx rats after exercise training. These results first indicate that endurance training is associated with modifications of ER transcripts levels in the liver, LV, and RA of female rats. More specifically, these effects are tissue and isoform-specific and the direction of the response (increase or decrease) is different in intact and Ovx rats. It is suggested that some of the adaptations to endurance training in liver and heart may be mediated by an ER-dependent mechanism.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by grants from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC; JML) and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR; JML and DP), and from CIHR MOP 53217 and CIHR NET SRD-63193, Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada (JG and MJ).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Département de kinésiologie, Université de Montréal, C.P. 6128, Succ. centre-ville, Montreal, QC, Canada, H3C 3J7

    Amélie Paquette, Marie-Soleil Gauthier & Jean-Marc Lavoie

  2. Laboratoire de biochimie cardiovasculaire, Centre hospitalier de l’Université de Montréal (CHUM Hôtel-Dieu), Montreal, QC, Canada

    Dongaho Wang, Marek Jankowski & Jolanta Gutkowska

  3. School of Human Kinetics, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada

    Denis Prud’homme

  4. URCM, Montfort Hospital, Ottawa, ON, Canada

    Denis Prud’homme

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  1. Amélie Paquette
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Correspondence to Jean-Marc Lavoie.

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Paquette, A., Wang, D., Gauthier, MS. et al. Specific adaptations of estrogen receptor α and β transcripts in liver and heart after endurance training in rats. Mol Cell Biochem 306, 179–187 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11010-007-9568-5

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