Temperature-dependent Arrest of Neutrophil Apoptosis

Abstract

Apoptosis is essential for the resolution of neutrophilic inflammation. To define the mechanisms triggering the execution phase of apoptosis we developed and utilized a model in which culture of human neutrophils at 15 °C for 20 h arrested apoptosis and subsequent warming to 37 °C triggered a synchronous burst of apoptosis. Treatment of 15 °C cultured neutrophils with the pan-caspase inhibitor zVAD-fmk just before warming to 37 °C inhibited the morphological changes associated with apoptosis, but did not prevent the insertion of the proapoptotic protein Bax into mitochondria nor the inhibition of secretion and the externalization of phosphatidylserine, indices of neutrophil apoptosis. In both intact neutrophils and a cell-free extract, cytochrome c released from mitochondria induced proteolytic cleavage of procaspase-3. At 15 °C the binding of Bax to mitochondria was uncoupled from Bax insertion into the mitochondrial membrane required for the release of cytochrome c. Apoptosis was also inhibited by low pH during warming to 37 °C, suggesting that changes to the conformation of Bax, necessary for membrane insertion, were being inhibited. Bax insertion was only sensitive to zVAD-fmk when added at the start of the 15 °C culture period, suggesting that a cytoplasmic substrate of the effector caspases may mediate in the mechanism of Bax insertion into mitochondria.