Authors: Bart Legein Lieve Temmerman Erik A L Biessen Esther Lutgens
Publish Date: 2013/02/21
Volume: 70, Issue: 20, Pages: 3847-3869
Abstract
Cardiovascular disease CVD is the leading cause of mortality worldwide accounting for 167 million deaths each year The underlying cause of the majority of CVD is atherosclerosis In the past atherosclerosis was considered to be the result of passive lipid accumulation in the vessel wall Today’s picture is far more complex Atherosclerosis is considered a chronic inflammatory disease that results in the formation of plaques in large and midsized arteries Both cells of the innate and the adaptive immune system play a crucial role in its pathogenesis By transforming immune cells into pro and antiinflammatory chemokine and cytokineproducing units and by guiding the interactions between the different immune cells the immune system decisively influences the propensity of a given plaque to rupture and cause clinical symptoms like myocardial infarction and stroke In this review we give an overview on the newest insights in the role of different immune cells and subtypes in atherosclerosisThis work was supported by the AMC fellowship grant EL Humboldt Foundation Sofja Kovalevskaja grant to EL the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research VIDI grant to EL the Netherlands Heart Foundation established investigator grant to EL and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft DFG FOR809 and SFB 1054 to EL
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