Nitric Oxide Synthase Inhibitors Modulate Nerve-Growth-Factor Mediated Activation of Akt

Nitric oxide (NO) modulates nerve-growth-factor- (NGF-) mediated signaling and gene expression. In the present paper, the role of NO in NGF-mediated Akt activation in PC12 and IMR32 cells was investigated. Cells were treated with NGF (50 ng/mL) in the presence or absence of NO synthase (NOS) inhibitors and Akt phosphorylation assessed by western blot analysis. In both cell lines, Akt was phosphorylated within 15 min of NGF treatment. In PC12 cells, this level of phosphorylation was sustained for 60 min, while in IMR32 cells, the activation decreased after 30 min of NGF treatment. The nonselective NOS inhibitor Nω-nitro-L-arginine methylester (L-NAME; 20 mM) had no effect on NGF-mediated Akt phosphorylation in PC12 cells but in combination with NGF, the iNOS selective inhibitor s-methylisothiourea (S-MIU; 2.0 mM) maintained Akt phosphorylation up to 2 h. In IMR32 cells, both L-NAME and S-MIU prolonged the activation of Akt. Pretreatment with 50 μM U0126, a MAP kinase pathway inhibitor, also increased the activation of Akt in both cell lines. These data suggest that NO modulates the duration of phosphorylation of Akt in response to NGF and that this effect may, in part, be mediated by the effects of NO on the Ras-MAP kinase pathway.