Molecular Study of Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor Gene in Iranian Patients after Myocardial Infarction

Background: stimulation of collateral artery growth (arteriogenesis)andlor capillary network growth (angiogenesis) wouldbe beneficial to the patients with myocardial infarction. to understandthe central role of vascular endothelial growth factor(vegf) in biological angiogenesis, we performed molecularanalysis of the vegf gene in patients afflicted with acute myocardialinfarction (ami).method: forty patients with ami were divided into twogroups according to the presence or absence of created collateralblood vessels in ischemic myocardial region. in these patientswe also evaluated the possible relationship of plasmalevels of vegf and its growing ability of new blood vessels,the molecular characterisation of vegf gene may highlightthe presence of natural genomic variants which could facilitatethe formation of new vessels in the ischemic area.results: the genomic analysis of vegf gene did not revealany mutations in the coding region, but showed the presenceof four and one single nucleotide substitutions in the intronicregion and 5'utr respectively. the c to t nucleotide transitionat position -7 of 5' utr is located in a potential bindingsite for sp-l transcription factor, which could probably affectthe vegf gene transcription.conclusion: the molecular study of vegf gene showed thatits coding region is highly conserved. therefore, variations ofangiogenesis could be due to the regulatory elements participatingin this mechanism