Expression of inflammation-related genes in human atherosclerotic plaques

Aims: Atherosclerosis is an inflammator y disease which molecular mechanisms are not been completely investigated. Our aim is to perform a wide expression study of inflammation related genes in human atherosclerotic plaques. Methods: The Human Inflammation Array (Applied Biosystems) was used to perform the mRNA quantification of 92 inflammation-related genes in 12 atherosclerotic plaques, their respective adjacent regions (with a lower grade lesion) and 7 healthy ar teries. The principle of the array is the real-time PCR amplification with a TaqMan probe specific for each gene. Data analysis was performed with SDS 2.3 software with the comparative Ct method using the gene beta-2-microglobulin as h…