Current Vascular Pharmacology - Volume 13, Issue 3, 2015

Abdominal aortic aneurysms (AAA) are an important source of morbidity and mortality in the U.S. and worldwide. Treatment options are limited, with open surgery or endovascular repair remaining the only curative treatments. Classical cardiovascular medications have generally failed to prevent or significantly alter AAA formation or progression. Therefore, there is a tremendous need for better therapeutic approaches. Read More

Atherosclerosis (also known as arteriosclerotic vascular disease) is a chronic inflammatory disease of the arterial wall, characterized by the formation of lipid-laden lesions. The activation of endothelial cells at atherosclerotic lesion–prone sites in the arterial tree results in the up-regulation of cell adhesion molecules and chemokines, which mediate the recruitment of circulating monocytes. Accumulation of monoc Read More

microRNAs (miRNAs), small non-coding RNA molecules that act as negative regulators of gene expression, are involved in a wide range of biological functions and control several cellular processes. This review illustrates miRNA regulation and function in tissue response to acute ischemia, focusing on miRNA role in acute myocardial infarction and describing a subset of miRNAs de-regulated upon cardiac ischemia. These miRNAs ma Read More

Peripheral artery disease (PAD) produces significant disability attributable to lower extremity ischemia. Limited treatment modalities exist to ameliorate clinical symptoms in patients with PAD. Growing evidence links microRNAs to key processes that govern disease expression in PAD including angiogenesis, endothelial function, inflammation, vascular regeneration, vascular smooth muscle cell function, restenosis, and Read More

Due to increased life expectancy in a growing world population, the impact of ageing on the pathophysiology of cardiovascular diseases will increase. Therefore, a better understanding of agerelated biological changes is important and necessary to combat cardiovascular diseases in the future. microRNAs (miRs) are small non coding RNAs emerging as key regulator in several vascular pathologies such as atherosclerosis Read More

MicroRNAs have emerged as key players of gene regulation during development and disease states like cancer and cardiovascular diseases. Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH), a vascular disease characterized by pulmonary resistance and vessel occlusion, is not spared by microRNA implication. This is not surprising since PAH shares common aberrantly activated pathways with cancers that lead to proliferation and su Read More

MicroRNAs are negative regulators of gene expression that have been shown to be essential elements in the coordination of complex regulatory pathways. One of these short non-coding RNAs, microRNA-126, is highly enriched in the vascular endothelium and was shown to play distinct roles in angiogenesis, vasculogenesis and endothelial inflammation. Abrogation of this microRNA leads to severe complications in the respons Read More

Stroke is a leading cause of death and disability worldwide. Ischemic stroke is the dominant subtype of stroke and results from focal cerebral ischemia due to occlusion of major cerebral arteries. Thus, the restoration or improvement of reduced regional cerebral blood supply in a timely manner is very critical for improving stroke outcomes and poststroke functional recovery. The recovery from ischemic stroke largely reli Read More

Several non-coding microRNAs (miRs) are implicated in the pathogenesis of obesity, metabolic syndrome, diabetes mellitus, atherosclerosis and cardiovascular disease. Some of these miRs are beneficial but others are hazardous. Silencing of the latter by antisense oligonucleotides has been attempted in animal models with promising results. However, the replacement of down-regulated beneficial miRs, by manufactured miR Read More

Heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF). Arterial hypertension (AH), arterial stiffness (AS), older age, and female gender are the main determinants of HFpEF, but several cardiac or extra-cardiac pathologies are also possible causes. The combined ventricular-vascular stiffening (abnormal left atrium-left ventricle coupling related to AS) is the main contributor of the increased prevalence of HFpEF in elderly perso Read More

The current paradigm in attempting to treat metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC) is a first line treatment with a vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) antagonist and second and subsequent treatments with either a vascular endothelial growth factor receptor (VEGFR) or an mTOR (mammalian Target of Rapamycin) inhibitor, while conventional chemotherapeutic and hormonal treatments do not play a role in the m Read More

Levels of 25-hydroxy vitamin D [25(OH)D] are reported to be decreased in cardiovascular disease (CVD) and in other chronic immunopathologies. Vitamin D (vitD) has been shown to be significantly linked to mortality, and is thought to be a predictor of survival. Therefore, supplementation with vitD has been suggested as an option to improve clinical outcomes. In contrast to the causal assumption, we hypothesize that the decre Read More

Cilostazol (CIL) is effective for the treatment of patients with peripheral arterial disease (PAD). CIL is an orally administered drug with multiple effects, including anti-platelets aggregation, favorable functions on plasmatic lipids and vasodilator ones, but how these effects might be related to improvement in patients walking affected by PAD is not fully understood. The latest data demonstrate that nitric oxide (NO) is induced b Read More

Aberrant proliferation of vascular smooth muscle cells [VSMCs] is implicated in the pathogenesis of vascular pathologies such as atherosclerosis and restenosis. Accumulating evidences have revealed that microRNAs are involved in cell proliferation in various pathological conditions. In the present study, we showed that miR-136 was up regulated in human coronary atherosclerotic plaques when compared with normal coro Read More

Essential hypertension is closely related to alterations of the microcirculation as evidenced by increased media-to-lumen ratio of small resistance arteries and capillary rarefaction. It has been proposed that microvasculature alterations can further deteriorate target organ damage under the influence of increased hemodynamic load in hypertension. More than a decade ago, small artery structure was found to be the most pot Read More