Personalized tissue-engineered arteries as vascular graft transplants: A safety study in sheep.

Patients with cardiovascular disease often need replacement or bypass of a diseased blood vessel. With disadvantages of both autologous blood vessels and synthetic grafts, tissue engineering is emerging as a promising alternative of advanced therapy medicinal products for individualized blood vessels. By reconditioning of a decellularized blood vessel with the recipient's own peripheral blood, we have been able to prevent rejection without using immunosuppressants and prime grafts for efficient recellularization Recently, decellularized veins reconditioned with autologous peripheral blood were shown to be safe and functional in a porcine study as a potential alternative for vein grafting.

pH-Dependent Protonation of Histidine Residues Is Critical for Electrostatic Binding of Low-Density Lipoproteins to Human Coronary Arteries.

Background: The initiating step in atherogenesis is the electrostatic binding of LDL (low-density lipoprotein) to proteoglycan glycosaminoglycans in the arterial intima. However, although proteoglycans are widespread throughout the intima of most coronary artery segments, LDL is not evenly distributed, indicating that LDL retention is not merely dependent on the presence of proteoglycans. We aim to identify factors that promote the interaction between LDL and the vessel wall of human coronary arteries.

APRIL limits atherosclerosis by binding to heparan sulfate proteoglycans.

Atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease causes heart attacks and strokes, which are the leading causes of mortality worldwide. The formation of atherosclerotic plaques is initiated when low-density lipoproteins bind to heparan-sulfate proteoglycans (HSPGs) and become trapped in the subendothelial space of large and medium size arteries, which leads to chronic inflammation and remodelling of the artery wall. A proliferation-inducing ligand (APRIL) is a cytokine that binds to HSPGs, but the physiology of this interaction is largely unknown.

Intussusceptive Angiogenesis in Human Metastatic Malignant Melanoma.

Angiogenesis supplies oxygen and nutrients to growing tumors. Inhibiting angiogenesis may stop tumor growth, but vascular endothelial growth factor inhibitors have limited effect in most tumors. This limited effect may be explained by an additional, less vascular endothelial growth factor-driven form of angiogenesis known as intussusceptive angiogenesis.

Glucosylceramide synthase deficiency in the heart compromises β1-adrenergic receptor trafficking.

Aims: Cardiac injury and remodelling are associated with the rearrangement of cardiac lipids. Glycosphingolipids are membrane lipids that are important for cellular structure and function, and cardiac dysfunction is a characteristic of rare monogenic diseases with defects in glycosphingolipid synthesis and turnover. However, it is not known how cardiac glycosphingolipids regulate cellular processes in the heart.