Journal
JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL MEDICINE
Volume 191, Issue 2, Pages 303-311Publisher
ROCKEFELLER UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1084/jem.191.2.303
Keywords
interleukin 1; vasculitis; aorta; arteritis; chronic disease
Categories
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Branch points and flexures in the high pressure arterial system have long been recognized as sites of unusually high turbulence and consequent stress in humans are foci for atherosclerotic lesions, We show that mice that ape homozygous for a null mutation in the gene encoding an endogenous antiinflammatory cytokine, interleukin 1 receptor antagonist (IL-1ra), develop lethal arterial inflammation involving branch points and flexures of the aorta and its primary and secondary branches, We observe massive transmural infiltration of neutrophils, macrophages, and CD4+ T cells. Animals appear to die from vessel wall collapse, stenosis, and organ infarction or from hemorrhage from ruptured aneurysms. Heterozygotes do not die from arteritis within a year of birth but do develop small lesions, which suggests that a reduced level of IL-1ra is insufficient to fully control inflammation in arteries, Our results demonstrate a surprisingly specific role for IL-1ra in the control of:spontaneous inflammation in constitutively stressed artery walls, suggesting that expression of IL-1 is likely to have a significant role in signaling artery wall damage.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available