Apoptosis in vascular disease: opportunities for genetic therapeutic intervention.

Apoptosis functions to efficiently eliminate normal cells no longer required in remodelling tissues, and abnormal cells exhibiting neoplastic phenotypes. Since injury is an important trigger to the development of vascular lesions, the balance of proliferation and apoptosis during the healing response, and aberrations of this process, may be important factors in lesion progression. The expression of genes that regulate this process, including c-myc and members of the bcl-2 and lce gene families, has been detected in the normal vasculature, and in atheromatous tissues. These observations suggest that the transfer of apoptosis-inducing genes into vascular lesions may be a feasible, non-inflammatory strategy to eliminate the cellular components of restenotic and atherosclerotic plaques.