Lung antioxidant enzymes and cardiopulmonary responses in young rats exposed to hyperoxia and treated intratracheally with PEG catalase and superoxide dismutase.

The 27-day-old rat exposed to 100% oxygen (O2) for 8 days will have predictable lung vascular and parenchymal changes at 60 days of age. Using this model, the goals of this study are (1) to measure the lung antioxidant enzyme activities serially following intratracheal PEG antioxidant therapy during the 8-day O2 exposure; and (2) to assess chronic cardiopulmonary changes in the O2-exposed rats treated with PEG-CAT and/or PEG-CuZn SOD given intraperitoneally (IP) and/or intratracheally (IT). The study encompassed 202 male rats exposed to room air or oxygen. CuZn SOD doses were 300 U IT and 2000 U IP. The CAT dose was 500 or 4000 U IT and 10,000 U IP. At 60 days of age, the right ventricular systolic pressure (RVP), RV weight, % acinar wall arterial thickness, and parenchymal air space were significantly increased in O2-exposed rats compared to RA rats. The RVP, RV weight, and parenchymal changes were prevented by daily IT PEG-CAT 4000 U + CuZn SOD 300 U but the increased small artery muscularization was not. Three hours after the initial dose of IT PEG-CAT 4000 U, lung CAT activity was more than doubled and remained constant throughout the 8-day daily treatment course. This dose of CAT depressed the induction response to O2 of CuZn and MnSOD. It is concluded that daily intratracheal administration of PEG-CAT 4000 U + CuZn SOD 300 U can significantly ameliorate some of the chronic parenchymal and vascular lung O2 toxic changes. However, it appears that high-dose exogenous PEG-CAT suppresses the endogenous enzyme induction to hyperoxia of both CuZn and Mn-SOD.