Johns Hopkins cardiologist Brian Kral, M.D., M.P.H., says the abundance of activity in this particular region of the genome, including CDK2NB and ANRIL, suggests that everyday replication of this zone could play a more fundamental, underlying role in the progression of coronary artery disease in all races.

Kral, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins and its Heart and Vascular Institute. was co-lead investigator of the latest study, along with Hopkins genetic epidemiologist Rasika Mathias, Sc.D. The team next plans to further investigate the ANRIL subregion of 9p21 to see if any single genetic changes speed up or slow down progression of coronary diseases.

Blood samples for the genetic analysis came from a larger study being led by Becker of some 4,000 people from white and African-American ethnic backgrounds. Called the Genetic Study of Atherosclerosis Risk (GeneSTAR), under way at Johns Hopkins since 1983, it involves participants who were all healthy upon enrollment, with no existing symptoms of heart disease. All were monitored for at least five years with periodic check-ups to see who developed heart disease and who did not. Each had a sibling or a parent who had a history of coronary artery disease or some other symptom of blocked arteries, such as chest pain or shortness of breath. The latest study was based on results collected through 2007, by which time 35 black study participants had suffered some form of heart attack or needed an angioplasty or X-ray scan of the heart’s blood vessels to confirm or rule out arterial blockages.

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Study funding was provided by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI), a member of the National Institutes of Health, and the Johns Hopkins Clinical Research Center.

In addition to Becker, Kral and Mathias, other Hopkins researchers involved in this report are Bhoom Suktitipar, M.D.; Ingo Ruczinski, Ph.D.; Dhananjay “Jay” Vaidya, M.B.B.S., Ph.D.; Lisa Yanek, M.P.H.; and Lewis Becker, M.D. Arshed Quyyumi, M.D.; Riyaz Patel, M.D.; A Maziar Zafari, M.D., Ph.D.; and Viola Vaccarino, M.D., Ph.D., all at Emory University in Atlanta, also contributed to the research. Further study assistance and support was provided from Elizabeth Hauser, Ph.D., and William Kraus, M.D., both at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C.

Contact: David March
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