Does cellular sex matter? Dimorphic transcriptional differences between female and male endothelial cells.

Objective: Significant sex differences exist in cardiovascular diseases. Although an impact of gonadal hormones is presumed, it is largely unknown whether sexually dimorphic gene expression also plays a role and whether cells themselves show intrinsic sex differences.

Methods: We performed whole genome expression analyses in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) from 20 male and 20 female donors and compared levels of gene transcription between the sexes.