Serum-dependent potentiation of lipopolysaccharide-induced nitric oxide production is mediated by the events after the transcription of inducible type of nitric oxide synthase.

The mechanism of serum-dependent potentiation of lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced nitric oxide (NO) production was studied by incubating mouse macrophage cell line, RAW 264.7, in the presence of fetal bovine serum (FBS). The addition of FBS definitely enhanced LPS-induced NO production through augmented expression of inducible type NO synthase (iNOS) mRNA and protein. However, nuclear run-on analysis demonstrated only marginal enhancement in the rate of LPS-induced iNOS gene transcription in the presence of FBS. Further, there was no significant difference in the luciferase reporter gene activity linked to the iNOS promoter-enhancer gene in response to LPS between the presence and absence of FBS. FBS-dependent enhancement did not appear to involve the initial step for triggering iNOS transcription in LPS-induced NO production. Rather, FBS was suggested to affect the accumulation and stabilization of iNOS mRNA leading to iNOS protein and NO production by some post-transcriptional regulatory mechanism.