19-21 May, 2013 Network Meeting – The Vasculomorph Network gathered in Tiburon, California, hosted by Dr. Akiko Hata’s lab, for 3 days of inspiring discussions and data on pulmonary vascular disease and development, the role of microRNAs, and animal models of disease. Guest speaker Dr. Rick Derynck presented his group’s work on the membrane regulation of TGF-beta and BMP signaling. Several new fellows joining the group, including Drs. Paola Caruso (Cambridge), David Rhee, Aranya Bagchi, Ivana Nikolic (Harvard), and Yao Lu (UCSF), gave presentations on their projects.
14 June, 2013 – Circulating angiogenic modulatory factors predict survival and functional class in pulmonary arterial hypertension
Rajeev Malhotra, Samuel Paskin-Flerlage, Roham T Zamanian, Patrick Zimmerman, Jonathan W Schmidt, Donna Y Deng, Mark Southwood, Robert Spencer, Carol S Lai, William Parker, Richard N Channick, Nicholas W Morrell, C Gregory Elliott, Paul B Yu. Pulmonary Circulation, June 2013
This article describes the prognostic relevance and sensitivity of circulating angiogenic modulatory proteins soluble endoglin and soluble Flt-1. These proteins are elevated even in mildly symptomatic individuals with pulmonary arterial hypertension, and may be related to ongoing angiogenic activity in the setting of pulmonary vascular disease. This work represents a collaboration between Network members at Cambridge University and Harvard, as well as investigators at the University of Utah, Stanford University, and Duke University.
10-12 January, 2013 Network Meeting – The Vasculomorph Network gathered in Ashridge, UK, hosted by Dr. Jim Smith’s lab, for 3 days of discussion on novel models of pulmonary vascular disease, translational work in pulmonary arterial hypertension, vascular calcification, and micro RNA function. Dr. Ken Bloch presents new data on 3′ UTR regulation of atrial natriuretic peptide.
13 October, 2012 – Global analysis of the haematopoietic and endothelial transcriptome during zebrafish development
JE Cannon, ES Place, AMJ Eve, CR Bradshaw, A Sesay, NW Morrell, JC Smith. Mechanisms of Development 130, 122-131 (2013).
This paper uses zebrafish embryos to characterise the transcriptome of the developing blood and endothelium, two cell types that are closely associated during development. High-throughput sequencing identified 754 genes whose transcripts are enriched threefold or more in blood and/or vascular endothelial cells compared with the rest of the embryo. Of these genes, 388 were classified as novel to these cell types. Analysis by quantitative PCR and in situ hybridisation confirmed that 83% (n = 41) of these novel genes are expressed in blood or vascular endothelium. Of 10 novel genes selected for knockdown by antisense morpholino oligonucleotides, two (tmem88a and trim2a) proved to be required for primitive erythropoiesis and myelopoiesis. Our results provide a catalogue of genes whose expression is enriched in the developing blood and endothelium in zebrafish, many of which will be required for the development of those cell types, both in fish and in mammals.