The effect of tracheal occlusion in congenital diaphragmatic hernia in the nitrofen rat lung explant model

Purpose Here, we establish a tracheal occlusion (TO) model with rat lung explants in nitrofen-induced pulmonary hypoplasia in the congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH). Methods We extracted lungs from rats on an embryonic day 18. We mimicked TO in the lung explants by tying the trachea. We assessed lung weight, morphometry, and abundance of Ki-67, Active caspase-3, and Prosurfactant Protein C (proSP-C) with immunofluorescence. Results Lung weight was higher in TO + than TO – on day 1. Abundance of Ki-67 was higher in TO + than TO – (0.15 vs. 0.32, p = 0.009 for day 1, 0.07 vs. 0.17, p = 0.004 for day 2, 0.07 vs. 0.12, p = 0.044 for day 3), and Active caspase-3 was higher in TO + than TO – on day 2 and day 3 (0.04 vs. 0.03 p = 0.669 for day 1, 0.03 vs. 0.13 p < 0.001 for day 2, 0.04 vs. 0.17 p = 0.008 for day3). However, proSP-C protein abundance was lower in TO + than TO – (67.9 vs. 59.1 p = 0.033 for day 1, 73.5 vs. 51.6 p = 0.038 for day 2, 83.1 vs. 56.4 p = 0.009 for day 3). Conclusions The TO model in lung explants mimics the outcomes of current surgical models of TO and further studies can reveal the cellular and molecular effects of TO in CDH lungs.