High density lipoprotein from coronary artery disease patients caused abnormal expression of long non-coding RNAs in vascular endothelial cells

Increased evidence has showed that normal high density lipoprotein (HDL) could convert to dysfunctional HDL in diseases states including coronary artery disease (CAD), which regulated vascular endothelial cell function differently. Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) play an extensive role in various important biological processes including endothelial cell function. However, whether lncRNAs are involved in the regulation of HDL metabolism and HDL-induced changes of vascular endothelial function remains unclear. Cultured human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) were treated with HDL from healthy subjects and patients with CAD and hypercholesterolemia for 24 h, then the cells were collected for lncRNA-Seq and the expressions of lncRNAs, genes and mRNAs were identified. The bioinformatic analysis was used to evaluate the relationship among lncRNAs, encoding genes and miRNAs. HDL from healthy subjects and patients with CAD and hypercholesterolemia leaded to different expressions of lncRNAs, genes and mRNAs, and further analysis suggested that the differentially expressed lncRNAs played an important role in the regulation of vascular endothelial function. Thus, HDL from patients with CAD and hypercholesterolemia could cause abnormal expression of lncRNAs in vascular endothelial cells to affect vascular function.