Carnitine, apelin and resveratrol regulate mitochondrial quality control (QC) related proteins and ameliorate acute kidney injury: role of hydrogen peroxide

Abstract

Mitochondrial impairment is recognised as a prominent feature in kidney diseases. Therefore, we investigated whether the effects of resveratrol, L-carnitine, and apelin in the acute kidney injury model were associated with modulation of mitochondrial quality control (QC) related proteins, intra-renal renin-angiotensin (RAS) activity, adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and Na⁺-K⁺ ATPase gene expression. Rats were randomly assigned to 7 groups: Distilled water injected control group, DMSO injected control group, distilled water injected lipopolysaccharide (LPS) group, DMSO injected LPS group, resveratrol injected LPS group, L-carnitine injected LPS group and apelin 13 injected LPS group. We observed that resveratrol, L-carnitine, and apelin treatments altered mitochondrial (QC) related protein levels (Pink1, Parkin, BNIP-3, Drp1, and PGC1α), decreased intra-renal RAS parameters, increased ATP level and upregulated Na⁺-K⁺ ATPase gene expression in renal tissue. Our results provide new insight into the role of mitochondrial quality control and how different antioxidants exert beneficial effects on acute kidney injury.

Keywords:

• Resveratrol
• carnitine
• apelin
• kidney
• mitochondria

Acknowledgement

The skilful technical assistance of Afaf Ahmed, Aza Nabil and Tarek Mamdouh is appreciated.

Disclosure statement

All the authors have declared no competing interest.

Author contributions

M.S., M.A. and N.S. contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by M.S., M.A., O.M., L.R., M.M., A.EM, A.MG. and N.S. The first draft of the manuscript was written by N.S. and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.