Blood vessels, disease pathogenesis, and novel therapies

Building blood vessels in development and disease.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW This review will examine developmental angiogenesis and tumor-related changes to endothelial cells. RECENT FINDINGS Processes that govern developmental angiogenesis become dysfunctional in the tumor environment, leading to abnormal tumor endothelial cells and blood vessels. Recent findings suggest that tumor endothelial cells are permanently modified compared with normal cou...

Modeling Diamond-Blackfan Anemia in the Mouse: Disease Pathogenesis and Evaluation of Novel Therapies

ANCA-associated vasculitis: pathogenesis, novel markers of the disease and emerging therapies.

Much has been learned in recent years on the pathogenesis of ANCA-associated small-vessel vasculitis. The interaction of primed neutrophils with ANCA and endothelial cells is crucial to the disease. Next we gained a better understanding, from animal models, of the pathogenetic importance of the ANCA antibody. Very recent evidence provides intriguing data regarding the link between infection and...

Novel therapies for cytomegalovirus disease.

Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection is one of the most important infectious complications of solid-organ transplantation, a serious, life-threatining, opportunistic pathogen in HIV-infected patients, and may cause hearing defects and irreversible central nervous system disease in infants infected during gestation. Four drugs are currently licensed for prophylaxis, pre-emptive therapy, and treatment...

Purinergic signaling and blood vessels in health and disease.

Purinergic signaling plays important roles in control of vascular tone and remodeling. There is dual control of vascular tone by ATP released as a cotransmitter with noradrenaline from perivascular sympathetic nerves to cause vasoconstriction via P2X1 receptors, whereas ATP released from endothelial cells in response to changes in blood flow (producing shear stress) or hypoxia acts on P2X and P...