A number of oxylipins have been described as endogenous PPAR ligands. The very short biological half-lives of oxylipins suggest roles as autocrine or paracrine signaling molecules. While coronary arterial atherosclerosis is the root of myocardial infarction, aortic atherosclerotic plaque formation is a common readout of in vivo atherosclerosis studies in mice. Improved understanding of the compartmentalized sources of oxylipin PPAR ligands will increase our knowledge of the roles of PPAR signaling in diverse vascular tissues. Here, we performed a targeted lipidomic analysis of ex vivo-generated oxylipins from porcine aorta, coronary artery, pulmonary artery and perivascular adipose. Cyclooxygenase (COX)-derived prostanoids were the most abundant detectable oxylipin from all tissues. By contrast, the coronary artery produced significantly higher levels of oxylipins from CYP450 pathways than other tissues. The TLR4 ligand LPS induced prostanoid formation in all vascular tissue tested. The 11-HETE, 15-HETE, and 9-HODE were also induced by LPS from the aorta and pulmonary artery but not coronary artery. Epoxy fatty acid (EpFA) formation was largely unaffected by LPS. The pig CYP2J homologue CYP2J34 was expressed in porcine vascular tissue and primary coronary artery smooth muscle cells (pCASMCs) in culture. Treatment of pCASMCs with LPS induced a robust profile of pro-inflammatory target genes: TNFα, ICAM-1, VCAM-1, MCP-1 and CD40L. The soluble epoxide hydrolase inhibitor TPPU, which prevents the breakdown of endogenous CYP-derived EpFAs, significantly suppressed LPS-induced inflammatory target genes. In conclusion, PPAR-activating oxylipins are produced and regulated in a vascular site-specific manner. The CYP450 pathway is highly active in the coronary artery and capable of providing anti-inflammatory oxylipins that prevent processes of inflammatory vascular disease progression.

Vascular pathologies are associated with changes in the presence and expression of morphologically distinct vascular smooth muscle cells. In particular, in complex human vascular lesions and models of disease in pigs and rodents, an intimal smooth muscle cell (iSMC) which exhibits a stable epithelioid or rhomboid phenotype in culture is often found to be present in high numbers, and may represent the reemergence of a distinct developmental vascular smooth muscle cell phenotype. The CYP450-oxylipin - soluble epoxide hydrolase (sEH) pathway is currently of great interest in targeting for cardiovascular disease. sEH inhibitors limit the development of hypertension, diabetes, atherosclerosis and aneurysm formation in animal models. We have investigated the expression of CYP450-oxylipin-sEH pathway enzymes and their metabolites in paired intimal (iSMC) and medial (mSMC) cells isolated from rat aorta. iSMC basally released significantly larger amounts of epoxy-oxylipin CYP450 products from eicosapentaenoic acid > docosahexaenoic acid > arachidonic acid > linoleic acid, and expressed higher levels of CYP2C12, CYP2B1, but not CYP2J mRNA compared to mSMC. When stimulated with the pro-inflammatory TLR4 ligand LPS, epoxy-oxylipin production did not change greatly in iSMC. In contrast, LPS induced epoxy-oxylipin products in mSMC and induced CYP2J4. iSMC and mSMC express sEH which metabolizes primary epoxy-oxylipins to their dihydroxy-counterparts. The sEH inhibitors TPPU or AUDA inhibited LPS-induced NFκB activation and iNOS induction in mSMC, but had no effect on NFκB nuclear localization or inducible nitric oxide synthase in iSMC; effects which were recapitulated in part by addition of authentic epoxy-oxylipins. iSMCs are a rich source but not a sensor of anti-inflammatory epoxy-oxylipins. Complex lesions that contain high levels of iSMCs may be more resistant to the protective effects of sEH inhibitors.