MOLECULAR BIOLOGY OF THE CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEM

本次研讨会的重点将放在脊椎动物心脏的发育和遗传学上。在这个领域，这是一个特别令人兴奋的时期。其目标将是讨论和澄清由于研究小鼠的突变而出现的新范式，最近克隆的对人类心血管功能重要的基因，以及在斑马鱼中识别许多对胚胎心脏发育重要的基因，所有这些都与在雏鸟和两栖动物系统中正在进行的优雅的胚胎学相结合。斑马鱼、哺乳动物和其他物种心血管系统发育的单一决定似乎非常相似，并导致了关于建立心脏形状的潜在遗传模块的新理论。人类的单基因突变已经被克隆，揭示了最常见的心血管疾病的潜在倾向，从动脉粥样硬化到心律失常，再到心力衰竭。对信号转导级联的新理解显示出心脏和其他系统，特别是免疫系统的发育之间出人意料的相似之处，我们为心力衰竭的发生提供了统一的假说。最近已经描述了对心腔系统在前后和左右方向上的模式至关重要的基因，以及那些引导单向血流和心脏起搏的基因。这些实验的主要讨论焦点包括左不对称的起源，心脏和血管模式的性质，心脏应对环境或结构压力并导致心力衰竭的机制，以及将这些观察转化为新疗法的可能性。这次会议将汇集具有遗传学专业知识的研究人员，特别是那些在老鼠、人类和斑马鱼、心脏和血管胚胎学、心脏和免疫系统转导系统以及体内基因转移方面工作的研究人员，以交流这一迅速扩大的领域的信息。

The focus of this symposium will be upon the development and genetics of the vertebrate heart. This is a particularly exciting time in this field. The goal will be to discuss and clarify new paradigms which are emerging as a consequence of the study of mutations in mice, the recent cloning of genes important for cardiovascular function in humans and the identification of many genes important to embryonic heart development in the zebrafish, all coupled with ongoing elegant embryology in the chick and amphibian systems. The unitary decisions of development of the cardiovascular systems seem quite similar between zebrafish, mammal, and other species, and have led to new theories of the underlying genetic modules which establish heart form. Single gene mutations in humans have been cloned, shedding light on the underling propensities to the most common cardiovascular disorders, ranging from atherosclerosis to arrhythmias, to heart failure. New understanding of signal transduction cascades have shown unexpected similarities between the development of the heart and of other systems, especially the immune systems, and we have provided unifying hypotheses for the onset of heart failure. Genes have been described recently which are crucial to the patterning of the chamber system of the heart in the anterior-posterior and left-right directions, as well as those which direct uni-directional flow and cardiac pacemaking. Major focal points for discussion which derive from such experiments include the origin of left-asymmetry, the nature of patterning of the heart and of blood vessels, the mechanisms by which the heart deals with environmental or structural stress and which lead to heart failure, and the potential for translation of these observations into new therapies. This meeting will bring together investigators with expertise in genetics, especially those working in mouse, human, and zebrafish, embryology of the heart and vessels, cardiac and immune system transduction systems, and in vivo gene transfer, in order to exchange information in this rapidly expanding field.