The History of the WHHL Rabbit, an Animal Model of Familial Hypercholesterolemia (I) - Contribution to the Elucidation of the Pathophysiology of Human Hypercholesterolemia and Coronary Heart Disease.

The History of the WHHL Rabbit, an Animal Model of Familial Hypercholesterolemia (I) - Contribution to the Elucidation of the Pathophysiology of Human Hypercholesterolemia and Coronary Heart Disease. J Atheroscler Thromb. 2019 Nov 21;: Authors: Shiomi M Abstract Animal models that closely resemble both human disease findings and their onset mechanism have contributed to the advancement of biomedical science. The Watanabe heritable hyperlipidemic (WHHL) rabbit and its advanced strains (the coronary atherosclerosis-prone and the myocardial infarction-prone WHHL rabbits) developed at Kobe University (Kobe, Japan), an animal model of human familial hypercholesterolemia, have greatly contributed to the elucidation of the pathophysiology of human lipoprotein metabolism, hypercholesterolemia, atherosclerosis, and coronary heart disease, as described below. 1) The main part of human lipoprotein metabolism has been elucidated, and the low-density lipoprotein (LDL) receptor pathway hypothesis derived from studies using fibroblasts was proven in vivo. 2) Oxidized LDL accumulates in the arterial wall, monocyte adhesion molecules are expressed on arterial endothelial cells, and monocyte-derived macrophages infiltrate the arterial intima, resulting in the formation and progression of atherosclerosis. 3) Coronary lesions differ from aortic lesions in lesion composition. 4) Factors involved in the development of atherosclerosis differ between the co...
Source: Journal of Atherosclerosis and Thrombosis - Category: Cardiology Tags: J Atheroscler Thromb Source Type: research