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National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

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Publication Detail

Title: Urinary Levels of the Acrolein Conjugates of Carnosine Are Associated with Cardiovascular Disease Risk.

Authors: O'Toole, Timothy E; Li, Xiaohong; Riggs, Daniel W; Hoetker, David J; Baba, Shahid P; Bhatnagar, Aruni

Published In Int J Mol Sci, (2021 Jan 30)

Abstract: Carnosine is a naturally occurring dipeptide (β-alanine-L-histidine) which supports physiological homeostasis by buffering intracellular pH, chelating metals, and conjugating with and neutralizing toxic aldehydes such as acrolein. However, it is not clear if carnosine can support cardiovascular function or modify cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk. To examine this, we measured urinary levels of nonconjugated carnosine and its acrolein conjugates (carnosine-propanal and carnosine-propanol) in participants of the Louisville Healthy Heart Study and examined associations with indices of CVD risk. We found that nonconjugated carnosine was significantly associated with hypertension (p = 0.011), heart failure (p = 0.015), those categorized with high CVD risk (p < 0.001), body mass index (BMI; p = 0.007), high sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP; p = 0.026), high-density lipoprotein (HDL; p = 0.007) and certain medication uses. Levels of carnosine-propanal and carnosine-propanol demonstrated significant associations with BMI, blood glucose, HDL and diagnosis of diabetes. Carnosine-propanal was also associated with heart failure (p = 0.045) and hyperlipidemia (p = 0.002), but no associations with myocardial infarction or stroke were identified. We found that the positive associations of carnosine conjugates with diabetes and HDL remain statistically significant (p < 0.05) in an adjusted, linear regression model. These findings suggest that urinary levels of nonconjugated carnosine, carnosine-propanal and carnosine-propanol may be informative biomarkers for the assessment of CVD risk-and particularly reflective of skeletal muscle injury and carnosine depletion in diabetes.

PubMed ID: 33573153 Exiting the NIEHS site

MeSH Terms: Acrolein/metabolism; Adult; Biomarkers/metabolism; Biomarkers/urine; Blood Glucose/analysis; Body Mass Index; C-Reactive Protein/analysis; Carnosine/metabolism; Carnosine/urine*; Cohort Studies; Diabetes Mellitus/blood; Diabetes Mellitus/epidemiology; Diabetes Mellitus/urine; Female; Heart Failure/blood; Heart Failure/epidemiology*; Heart Failure/urine; Humans; Hyperlipidemias/blood; Hyperlipidemias/epidemiology*; Hyperlipidemias/urine; Hypertension/blood; Hypertension/epidemiology*; Hypertension/urine; Linear Models; Lipoproteins, HDL/blood; Male; Risk Assessment/methods; Risk Factors

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