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Dog models of human atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases

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Abstract

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are one of the leading causes of death worldwide. Eighty-five percent of CVD-associated deaths are due to heart attacks and stroke. Atherosclerosis leads to heart attack and stroke through a slow progression of lesion formation and luminal narrowing of arteries. Dogs are similar to humans in terms of their cardiovascular physiology, size, and anatomy. Dog models have been developed to recapitulate the complex phenotype of human patients and understand the underlying mechanism of CVD. Different methods, including high-fat, high-cholesterol diet and genetic modification, have been used to generate dog models of human CVD. Remarkably, the location and severity of atherosclerotic lesions in the coronary arteries and branches of the carotid arteries of dog models closely resemble those of human CVD patients. Overt clinical manifestations such as stroke caused by plaque rupture and thrombosis were observed in dog models. Thus, dog models can help define the pathophysiological mechanisms of atherosclerosis and develop potential strategy for preventing and treating CVD. In this review, we summarize the progress in generating and characterizing canine models to investigate CVD and discuss the advantages and limitations of canine CVD models.

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Data availability

All data are available by contacting the corresponding author Y.Q. Zhang (yqzhang@genetics.ac,cn).

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Acknowledgements

We thank Dr. Jianglin Fan and Zhongzhou Yang for discussion and comments on the manuscript. We thank Drs. Liangxue Lai, Jidong Mi, and Jianping Zhao for initiating the project of dog CVD models.

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (32100783 to H. Zhao, 31830036 and 31921002 to Y.Q. Zhang), the National Key Research and Development Program (2019YFA0707100 and 2021ZD0203901 to Y.Q. Zhang), the Strategic Priority Research Program B of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDBS1020100 to Y.Q. Zhang), and the Natural Science Foundation of Shaanxi Province (Grant No. 2020PT-001 to E. Liu).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Molecular Developmental Biology, Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Hui Zhao & Yong Q. Zhang

  2. Laboratory Animal Center, Xi’an Jiaotong University Health Science Center, Xi’an, China

    Enqi Liu

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  1. Hui Zhao
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HZ, EQL, and YQZ wrote the main manuscript text and HZ prepared Figs. 1. All authors reviewed the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Yong Q. Zhang.

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Zhao, H., Liu, E. & Zhang, Y.Q. Dog models of human atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases. Mamm Genome 34, 262–269 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00335-022-09965-w

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