Alleviating the ischemia-reperfusion injury of donor liver by transfection of exogenous hTERT genes

Ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) injury had been linked to primary graft dysfunction in transplantation. To find effective methods to alleviate donor liver injury from I/R, we transferred exogenous human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT) genes into donor rats before liver transplantation.SD rats (age, 16 months) were divided into 3 groups: group A were donors pretreated with exogenous hTERT gene; group B were donors pretreated with adenovirus vector only; and group C were donors pretreated with physiologic saline. Alanine aminotransferase (ALT), apoptotic index, telomerase activity, and histological evaluation were calculated after liver transplantation.The levels of ALT and apoptotic index of group A were significantly lower than those of group B or group C (P.05), at the same time, a mild histological injury and increased telomerase activity were also observed in group A.Exogenous hTERT gene provides protection against I/R injury, which depends on exogenous hTERT gene-mediated inhibition of apoptosis.