Five resin casts of the coronary arteries and the hislological sections of three hesrts with the arteries injected Chinese ink were prepared in human adult autopsy subjec s . 3187 branches of the coronary arterial trees were counted and measured . By Strahler's system the branch pattern of the coronary arterial tree was described . According to the analysis of the geometrical morphology data, the relationships between the diameter , the length and the number of branches in each order and the branch order show the exponential function respectively , which have high correlation significance (p

0.05). ITA contains elastin a relatively higher than the other two (P

For the 1st and 2nd pts.see ibid vol.11,no.4t p.241 & p.251 (1989).The anterior interventricular branch and the circumflex branch of the left coronary artery and the right coronary artery were excised from 7 autopsy adult subjects without heart diseases.A biaxial loading test lor the vascular specimens was completed,which was simultaneously finished in the internal thoracic artery (ITA) and the great saphenous vein (GSV) of the same subjects in order to compare with the coronary arteries.Elastic moduli of the vessels increased with increasing pressure in the vessels.As compared with GSV the mechanical properties of ITA ap-proach the coronary arteries.It is assumed that the coronary artery bypass grafting choose ITA before GSV in view of the mechanical properties of the vascular walls.A ratio of collagen per elastin may be used as an index of the arterial elasticity.It is discussed that the biomechanical properties of the arteries may influence the pathogenesis of the arteriosclerosis.

For the first pt.see ibid vol.11 no.4,p.241 (1989).The anterior interven-tricular branch aad the circumflex branch of the left coronary artery,and the right coronary were excised from 7 autopsy adult subjects without heart diseases.A biaxial loading test for the vascular specimens was completed,which was simultaneously finished in the internal thoracic artery(ITA) and the great saphenous vein (GSV) of the same subjects in order to compare with the coronary arteries.Stress-strain relationships of the vessels were expressed by the exponential strain energy function.The meaning of the two-dimensional material constants for the vessels are discussed.

0.05). The ITA contains relatively higher content of elastin as compared with the others (P

The normal arterial patterns in the left ventricle wall of 100 rabbit hearts were studied by means of postmortem coronary angiography, the clearing method and histological sections, and in comparison with that of the human heart.The intramural arterial patterns in the left ventricle of rabbit heart are similar to human heart in many ways. "Branching" type arteries (Class A vessels) supply the whole myocardium, including the subendocardial zone, while "straight" type arteries(Class B vessels)mainly supply the papillary muscle and trabeculae carneae where they form the subendocardial plexus. The arterial type in papillary muscles may be classified into segmental pattern, axial pattern and mixed pattern. The arterial distribution in the interventricular septum is without rule. The capillaries in all areas run parallel with the myocardial fibres and show cross connexions somewhere.

The normal arterial patterns in the left ventricle wall of 100 rabbithearts were studied by the methods of postmortem coronary angiogram, theclearing method and histological section, compared with that of the humanheart. The intramural arterial patterns in the left ventricle of the rabbitheart are similar to those of the human heart. "Branching" type arteries(Class A vessels) supply the whole of myocardium, including the subendoca-rdial zone, while "straight" type arteries(Class B vessels)mainly supply thepapillary muscle and trabeculae carneae where they form the subendocardialplexus. The arterial type in papillary muscles may be classified intosegmental pattern, axial pattern and mixed pattern. The arterial distributionof the left ventricular side in the interventricular septum is ruleless. Thecappillaries in all areas run parallel with the myocardial fibres and showthe crosscorexions somewhere.

Intramural vescular changes in the healing process after myocardial infarction were studied by the methods of histological section after ligating the left coronary artery of 119 rats. The intramural vascular patterns in the left ventricular free wall of the rat heart are similar to those of the human and the rabbit, but the patterns in the interventricular septum of the rat heart are only similar to those of the rabbit. The left ventricutar free wall contains 3,903?48 capillaries per mm~2 on the average. The capillaries in all areas run parallel with the myocardial fibres. After figuring the left coronary artery of the rat heart,the intramural vascular changes may be divided into three stages, i.e.avascularity, hypervascularity and hypovascularity, which coincide with the healing process of myocardial infarction. It is suggested that the coronary collateral circulation begins within the first two days, and increases gradually during 3 to 7 days after myocardial infarction. The evolutionary process of blood vessels in experimental myocardial infarction of rats is more rapid than that in the human and in the rabbit, but the process itself is similar to each other.

Objective: To study the effect of pulsating pressure on secretion of angiotensin Ⅱ(AngⅡ) by common carotid artery. Methods: The common carotid arteries of rats were perfused with both high pulsating pressure (160 mmHg,1 mmHg=0.133 kPa) and normal pulsating pressure (80 mmHg) for 0.5, 1, 3 and 6 h in vivo respectively. The concentration of AngⅡ in the perfusion medium were determined by radioimmunoassay (RIA). Results: The concentration of AngⅡ in the perfusion medium of the common carotid artery increased with perfusion time. Secretion of AngⅡ was higher in 160 mmHg group than that in 80 mmHg group( P

Objective To screen out the PI3K/Akt pathway related genes in vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) subjected to cyclic strain. Method VSMCs of rat aorta were subjected to cyclic strain (10 %, 1 Hz) by using a FX-4000T system. Phosphorylation of Akt was examined by Western blotting. Suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) method was employed to analyze the differently expressed cDNA sequence between the strained VSMCs pretreated with and without wortmannin, a specific inhibitor of PI3K. These fragments were ligated with T vectors, screened through the blue-white screening system to establish cDNA library, and was sequenced and analyzed in GenBank with BLASTN search.Result Level of Akt phosphorylation of VSMCs was significantly enhanced by the mechanical strain compared with the control. Ten different expressed sequence tags (EST) were gained after sequencing 30 clones randomly selected from 54 white clones. There may be six genes related with the mechanical strain and cell signal PI3K/Akt, such as High mobility group box 1 (HMGB1), Neural precursor cells expressed (Nedd4a), Cyclin-dependent kinase 5 (CDK5), Histone deacetylase 3 (HDAC3), Ubiquitin-like 1 (Uble1a) and Heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein H1 (hnRNP). Conclusion SSH is an effective and reliable approach to screen out the genes related with the mechanical strain and PI3K/Akt pathway in VSMCs.