Age-Related Aspects of the Involvement of Heat Shock Proteins in the Pathogenesis of Osteoarthritis

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to find the age-related features of changes in the levels of heat shock proteins (HSPs), chemokines, and a marker of collagen degradation in the blood of patients with osteoarthritis. The survey revealed that the involvement of HSPs in the pathogenesis of osteoarthrosis seems to be a complex and multilevel process. Under the influence of external risk factors, HSP70 acts as an adjuvant to the immune reaction involving chemokine CXCL17. Low levels of HSPs do not allow them to act as an autoimmune factor in the interaction with Toll-like receptors of immunocompetent cells, but they obviously contribute to the CXCL17-dependent activation of dendritic cells and macrophages that initiate local inflammation involving key cytokines, including TNF-α. Chondrocytes and osteoblasts subjected to a cytokine attack are not able to respond fully to the overexpression of HSP70 and HSP27 for whatever reason. With aging, the pathophysiology of osteoarthritis enters the phase of the local tissue reaction, where the processes of hypertrophic differentiation of chondrocytes and osteo-like cells of subchondral bone play an important role.