Other Transgenic Animal Models Used in Cardiovascular Studies

Previous chapters have described a large number of transgenic animal models used to study specific cardiovascular syndromes. This chapter will fill in some gaps. Many of these transgenic animals were developed to study normal and/or abnormal physiological responses in other organ systems, or to study basic biochemical and molecular reactions or pathways. These models were then discovered to also have effects on the cardiovascular system, some of them unanticipated. A word of caution, particularly when highly inbred mouse strains are used to develop transgenic models - not all strains of a particular species are created equal. When cardiovascular parameters of age- and sex-matched A/J and C57BL/6J inbred mice were compared the C57BL/6J mice demonstrated eccentric physiologic ventricular hypertrophy, increased ventricular function, lower heart rates, and increased exercise endurance.(1)