BACKGROUND Uveal melanomas can develop in the choroid, ciliary body and iris. In choroidal and ciliary body melanomas, specific chromosomal changes correlate with metastatic disease. Iris melanomas have a better prognosis than choroidal melanomas, and it would be interesting to know if they share chromosomal changes. In addition, iris melanomas might harbour UV-induced mutations of tumour suppr...

OBJECTIVE We established the Leipzig (LIFE) Heart Study, a biobank and database of patients with different stages of coronary artery disease (CAD) for studies of clinical, metabolic, cellular and genetic factors of cardiovascular diseases. DESIGN The Leipzig (LIFE) Heart Study (NCT00497887) is an ongoing observational angiographic study including subjects with different entities of CAD. Cohor...

BACKGROUND We investigated whether 9p21 polymorphisms are associated with cardiovascular events in a group of 611 patients enrolled in the Medical, Angioplasty or Surgery Study II (MASS II), a randomized trial comparing treatments for patients with coronary artery disease (CAD) and preserved left ventricular function. METHODS The participants of the MASS II were genotyped for 9p21 polymorphis...

Abstract Background Coronary artery disease (CAD) is the leading cause of death worldwide. Chromosome locus 9p21 was first to be associated with increased risk CAD and coronary calcification (CAC). Vascular increases for CAD. smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) are one major cell types involved in development vascular calcification. Methods So far, mainly animal models or primary SMCs have been used mo...

PURPOSE Renal cell carcinomas are often multifocal. We investigated the genomic signatures of multifocal clear cell renal cell carcinoma to determine whether multiple tumors in the same kidney bear a clonal relationship to one another. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN A total of 62 tumors from 26 patients who underwent radical nephrectomy were examined. All patients had multiple separate clear cell renal ...

Coronary artery disease (CAD) is still the most frequent cause of death in Western societies. It is now widely accepted that the classic environmental risk factors for atherosclerosis only partly explain the incidence of CAD and the development of acute coronary syndromes (ACS). Genetic factors that vary among human populations seem to be involved in the clinical manifestations of such patients...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Recently, a genome-wide association study identified associations between single nucleotide polymorphisms on chromosome 9p21 and risk of harboring intracranial aneurysm (IA). Aneurysm characteristics or subphenotypes of IAs, such as history of subarachnoid hemorrhage, presence of multiple IAs and location of IAs, are clinically important. We investigated whether the assoc...