Activation of PPAR α/γ mediates remote IPC against myocardial infarction
Although vast improvements have been made in the clinical care of patients suffering from an acute myocardial infarction, heart attacks still remain the No.1 cause of death in the western world. A promising approach in overcoming this troublesome issue is to make use of an innate cardioprotective response: the ability of short ischemic episodes to precondition the heart against a subsequent prolonged ischemic insult. This powerful form of protection not only reduces the resultant damage up to 50%, but can also be initiated from a distance, such as by using repetitive blood-pressure cuff inflations and deflations, a phenomenon known as remote ischemic preconditioning (remote IPC). In the work published in the January 2011 issue of Experimental Biology and Medicine, Dr. Lotz and coworkers used a clinically relevant animal model of remote IPC, as well as distinct biochemical markers to demonstrate an important role for the nuclear transcription factors peroxisome-proliferator-receptor...