Faster protein and ribosome synthesis in thyroxine-induced hypertrophy of rat heart.

Rates of protein synthesis and degradation were measured in hearts from normal and thyroxine-injected rats that were perfused as working preparations with Krebs-Henseleit bicarbonate buffer containing 400 microU insulin/ml, 2 mM lactate, 10 mM glucose, and normal plasma concentrations of amino acids. Hearts were perfused after four daily injections (1 microgram/g body wt) of thyroxine. Protein synthesis was 24% greater in hypertrophying hearts compared with controls; ribosomal RNA content increased 25%. In addition, the proportion of total RNA in free ribosomal subunits in hypertrophying hearts was unchanged from perfused hearts of control rats and from unperfused normal hearts. These results indicated that increased protein synthetic machinery as monitored by content of ribosomes, rather than more efficient initiation or elongation of peptide chains, accounted for the faster rate of protein synthesis in hypertrophying hearts. Rates of protein degradation were the same in hearts from thyroxine-injected and control animals. When rates of ribosome production were measured in vitro at various times after a single injection of thyroxine in vivo, faster ribosome synthesis was detected within 8 h; no change in the rate of total protein synthesis occurred after a single injection of thyroxine. These studies indicated that accelerated ribosome formation was an early and quantitatively important factor in cardiac hypertrophy.