Effects of Testosterone on Norepinephrine Release in Isolated Rat Heart

The effects of testosterone on norepinephrine release were investigated in the isolated rat hearts.Sprague-Dawley male rats (n=120) were randomized to testosterone and control groups.The rats in testosterone group were perfused with modified Krebs-Henseleit buffer containing different concentrations of testosterone (0.1,1.0,10.0,and 100.0 nmol/L,respectively).Myocardial ischemia was induced by globally stopping the perfusion flow.Exocytotic norepinephrine release was induced by electrical field stimulation at 5 V (effective voltage) and 6 Hz (pulse width of 2 ms) for 1 min.The overflow of norepinephrine was determined by high pressure liquid chromatography and electrochemical detec-tion (HPLC-EC).Following acute ischemia,testosterone (1.0,10.0 and 100.0 nmol/L) significantly re-duced norepinephrine release (P0.01),and the norepinepherine overflow was similar between the con-trol and 0.1 nmol/L testosterone group (P0.05).Electrical stimulation of the ventricle evoked norepi-nepherine release,and this was diminished by the perfusion with testosterone at the concentrations of 1.0,10.0 and 100.0 nmol/L (P0.01).It is suggested that testosterone suppresses ischemia-and electri-cal stimulationinduced norepinepherine release in the isolated rat hearts.