Abstract
Objectives: Vascular calcification is a major clinical problem and elucidating the underlying mechanism is important to improve the prognosis of patients with cardiovascular disease. We aimed to elucidate the role and mechanism of action of Hepatocyte Growth Factor (HGF)/c-Met signalling in vascular calcification and establish whether blocking this pathway could prevent mineralisation of vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) in vitro. Methods and results: We demonstrate increased HGF secretion and c-Met up-regulation and phosphorylation during VSMC osteogenic differentiation. Adenoviral-mediated over-expression of HGF (AdHGF) in VSMCs accelerated mineralisation, shown by alizarin red staining, and significantly increased 45Calcium incorporation (1.96±0.54-fold [P
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 440-447 |
Number of pages | 7 |
Journal | Atherosclerosis |
Volume | 219 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Dec 2011 |
Keywords
- C-Met
- Calcification
- Hepatocyte growth factor
- NK4
- Notch signalling
- Vascular smooth muscle cells