Hoffmann, R. A wiki for the life sciences where authorship matters. Nature Genetics (2008)

Javascript disabled

Please enable Javascript support in your browser to use this application.

Instructions on how to enable JavaScript on different browsers can be found here: http://www.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=23852.

[edit this page]

Laguens, R. et al.

Cardiomyocyte hyperplasia after plasmid-mediated vascular endothelial growth factor gene transfer in pigs with chronic myocardial ischemia.

BACKGROUND: For over 40 years it has been proposed that cardiomyocyte hyperplasia may occur in hypertrophic human hearts. While this implies that heart myocytes can undergo cytokinesis, evidence of conventional cell division has been exceptionally reported. Recently, we found that gene transfer of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) displays a mitogenic effect on adult cardiomyocytes. In the present study we searched for cardiomyocyte hyperplasia as evidence of VEGF-induced cardiomyocyte cytokinesis. METHODS: Three weeks after implanting an Ameroid constrictor at the origin of the left circumflex artery, 16 pigs were randomized to receive 10 direct intramyocardial injections of 3.8 mg of plasmid encoding for VEGF (pVEGF) or empty plasmid. Five weeks later, hearts were weighed, myocyte diameter was measured in tissue sections, and myocyte length and nuclei number were studied in isolated myocytes. A resting echocardiogram was performed immediately before reoperation and before sacrifice to evaluate global and regional left ventricular function. Investigators were blinded to the study groups and nature of the injectate until the end of data analysis. RESULTS: No heart weight differences existed between groups. However, in the ischemic myocardium, pVEGF-treated hearts had 22% more cardiomyocytes per unit volume and exhibited significantly more oligonucleated (1 or 2 nuclei) cardiomyocytes than hearts receiving empty plasmid. CONCLUSIONS: In pigs with chronic myocardial ischemia, VEGF gene transfer induced cardiomyocyte cytokinesis, as revealed by cardiomyocyte hyperplasia. Our finding extends the previously reported mitogenic effect of VEGF on adult cardiomyocytes and supports the hypothesis that VEGF may have a therapeutic role in diseases characterized by myocardial cell loss.[1]

References

Cardiomyocyte hyperplasia after plasmid-mediated vascular endothelial growth factor gene transfer in pigs with chronic myocardial ischemia. Laguens, R., Cabeza Meckert, P., Vera Janavel, G., De Lorenzi, A., Lascano, E., Negroni, J., Del Valle, H., Cuniberti, L., Martínez, V., Dulbecco, E., Melo, C., Fernández, N., Criscuolo, M., Crottogini, A. The journal of gene medicine. (2004) [Pubmed]

Annotations and hyperlinks in this abstract are from individual authors of WikiGenes or automatically generated by the WikiGenes Data Mining Engine. The abstract is from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.About WikiGenes Open Access Licence Privacy Policy Terms of Use

[search][advanced]