Vulnerable plaques have been a hot topic in the field of stroke and carotid atherosclerosis. Currently, risk stratification and intervention of carotid plaques are guided by the degree of luminal stenosis. Recently, it has been recognized that the vu...
Vulnerable coronary plaques are the primary substrate for acute coronary syndromes, representing a significant challenge in cardiovascular care. This review examines the pivotal role of intracoronary imaging, specifically intravascular ultrasound (IV...
Vulnerable coronary atherosclerotic plaque involves a dynamic pathophysiologic process within and surrounding an atheromatous plaque in coronary artery intima. The process drastically increases the risk of plaque rupture and is clinically responsible...
Atherosclerosis is characterized by intimal plaques of the arterial vessels that develop slowly and, in some cases, may undergo spontaneous rupture with subsequent heart attack or stroke. Currently, noninvasive diagnostic tools are inadequate to scre...
Stroke is a massive public health problem. The rupture of vulnerable carotid atherosclerotic plaques is the most common cause of acute ischemic stroke (AIS) across the world. Currently, vessel wall high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging (VW-HRMRI...
Objectives: Atherosclerosis is a chronic inflammatory disease characterized by complex pathological mechanisms. Early detection of vulnerable plaques is critical for assessing rupture risk and preventing acute cardiovascular events. Conventional ultr...
The concept of vulnerable carotid plaques is pivotal in understanding the pathophysiology of ischemic stroke secondary to large-artery atherosclerosis. In macroscopic evaluation, vulnerable plaques are characterized by one or more of the following fe...
Acute coronary syndrome (ACS) mostly arises from so-called vulnerable coronary plaques, particularly prone for rupture. Vulnerable plaques comprise a specific type of plaque, called the thin-cap fibroatheroma (TFCA). A TCFA is characterized by a larg...
This study investigated the effects of evolocumab on vulnerable coronary plaques and factors associated with the change in stability and size of plaques in patients taking statins. Vulnerable coronary plaques were defined using coronary computed tomo...
Coronary atherosclerosis is a complex, multistep process that may lead to critical complications upon progression, revolving around plaque disruption through either rupture or erosion. Several high-risk features are associated with plaque vulnerabili...
Background: Coronary artery disease remains the leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Increasing evidence has demonstrated that many acute coronary events originate not from severely obstructive lesions but from structurally unstable at...
Interactions between CD147 and cyclophilin A (CypA) promote plaque rupture that causes atherosclerosis-related cardiovascular events, such as myocardial infarction and stroke. Here, we investigated whether SP-8356 ((1S,5R)-4-(3,4-dihydroxy-5-methoxys...
Non-coding RNAs reflect many biological processes in the human body, including athero-sclerosis. In a cardiology outpatient department cohort (N = 83), we aimed to compare the levels of circulating microRNAs in groups with vulnerable plaques (N = 22)...
Patients with non-obstructive lipid-rich plaques (LRPs) on combined intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) and near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) are at high risk for future events. Local pre-emptive percutaneous treatment of LRPs with a paclitaxel-eluting d...
Atherosclerosis and its clinical manifestations, coronary and cerebral artery diseases, are the most common cause of death worldwide. The main pathophysiological mechanism for these complications is the rupture of vulnerable atherosclerotic plaques a...
Rupture of vulnerable plaques is the main cause of acute coronary syndromes and myocardial infarctions. Identification of these vulnerable plaques is therefore essential to enable the development of treatment modalities to stabilise them. Several int...
Atherosclerosis is a lipoprotein-driven inflammatory disorder leading to a plaque formation at specific sites of the arterial tree. After decades of slow progression, atherosclerotic plaque rupture and formation of thrombi are the major factors respo...
Atherosclerosis is responsible for 20% of ischemic strokes, and the plaques from the internal carotid artery the most frequently involved. Lipoproteins play a key role in carotid atherosclerosis since lipid accumulation contributes to plaque progress...
The introduction into clinical practice of intravascular imaging, including intravascular ultrasound (IVUS), optical coherence tomography (OCT) and their derivatives, allowed for the in vivo assessment of coronary atherosclerosis in humans, including...
Background: Reliable preoperative identification of carotid plaque instability remains challenging. Although duplex ultrasound allows early detection of carotid stenosis, it does not consistently predict plaque biological behavior. MicroRNAs (miRNAs)...
Acute coronary syndrome (ACS) describes a range of conditions associated with the rupture of high-risk or vulnerable plaque. Vulnerable atherosclerotic plaque is associated with many changes in its microenvironment which could potentially cause rapid...
Atherosclerotic carotid plaques are shaped by years of interaction between systemic risk factors, hematopoietic conditioning, vascular injury, and local immune responses, yet conventional assessment captures only a limited snapshot of this biological...
Coronary artery disease is a highly prevalent disease that constitutes the leading cause of mortality worldwide. Acute coronary syndromes are the most devastating form of presentation of coronary disease, involving the acute formation of a thrombus w...
Acute coronary syndromes due to atherosclerotic coronary artery disease are a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Intra-plaque hemorrhage (IPH), caused by disruption of intra-plaque leaky microvessels, is one of the major contributors...
Although low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) can now be effectively reduced, substantial residual risk of acute ischemic cardiovascular events persists. Lipoprotein(a) [Lp(a)] is an established causal risk factor for atherosclerotic cardiovas...
Atherosclerosis is a chronic long-lasting vascular disease leading to myocardial infarction and stroke. Vulnerable atherosclerotic (AS) plaques are responsible for these life-threatening clinical endpoints. To more successfully work against atheroscl...
Optical coherence tomography (OCT) has a high spatial resolution and is useful in identifying coronary lesions with high-risk features (vulnerable plaques). These plaques are strongly associated with acute coronary syndrome (ACS). In this report, we...
Carotid artery disease has traditionally been assessed based on the degree of luminal narrowing. However, this approach, which solely relies on carotid stenosis, is currently being questioned with regard to modern risk stratification approaches. Rece...
Background/Objectives: Carotid artery stenosis (CAS) is one of the main causes of stroke, and the vulnerability of plaque has been proved to be a determinant. A joint analysis of shear wave elastography, a radiofrequency echo-based wall tracking tech...
The classical concept of plaque vulnerability, centred on specific morphological features, has failed to deliver reliable risk prediction in clinical practice. Recent evidence highlights the need to redefine coronary vulnerability as a dynamic, patie...
Degree of luminal stenosis is generally considered to be an important indicator for judging the risk of atherosclerosis burden. However, patients with the same or similar degree of stenosis may have significant differences in plaque morphology and bi...
Objective: To investigate the differences in serum iron index and iron metabolizing protein expression in plaques in patients with different degrees of carotid artery stenosis and the relationship with plaque traits. Methods: A total of 100 patients...
Owing to the high risk of recurrence, identifying indicators of carotid plaque vulnerability in atherothrombotic ischemic stroke is essential. In this study, we aimed to identify modified LDLs and antioxidant enzymes associated with plaque vulnerabil...
Atheromatous disease is the first cause of death and dependency in developed countries and carotid artery atherosclerosis is one of the main causes of severe ischaemic strokes. Current management strategies are mainly based on the degree of stenosis...
Background/objectives: Acute coronary syndrome (ACS) is a major global health issue primarily caused by the rupture or erosion of vulnerable coronary plaques. Non-invasive identification of these plaques through coronary computed tomography angiograp...
The risk assessment for carotid atherosclerotic lesions involves not only determining the degree of stenosis but also plaque morphology and its composition. Recently, carotid contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) has gained importance for evaluating vu...
We aimed at evaluating the ability of point shear-wave elastography (pSWE) and of a radiofrequency (RF) echo-tracking-based method in preoperatively assessing the vulnerability of the carotid plaque in patients undergoing carotid endarterectomy (CEA)...
Ischemic stroke (IS) related to atherosclerosis of large arteries is one of the leading causes of mortality and disability in developed countries. Atherosclerotic internal carotid artery stenosis (ICAS) contributes to 20% of all cerebral ischemia cas...
Coronary microvascular dysfunction (CMD) is a major contributor to myocardial ischaemia and angina, both in the presence and absence of obstructive coronary artery disease, yet it remains underdiagnosed and therapeutically challenging. The mechanisti...
Radial wall strain (RWS) is an angiography-derived biomechanical index that quantifies plaque deformability from routine coronary angiography, offering a novel approach to assess plaque vulnerability beyond conventional anatomical and physiological p...
Background: Pentraxin 3 (PTX3) is a well-established inflammatory biomarker with significant implications in the pathogenesis and prognostic assessment of cardiovascular diseases. This study aimed to investigate the potential value of serum PTX3 as a...
The present study aimed to investigate the link between the severity of periodontal disease (PD), coronary calcifications and unstable plaque features in patients who underwent coronary computed tomography for unstable angina (UA). Fifty-two patients...
Angiotensin (Ang) II triggers vulnerable atherosclerotic plaque development. Bone marrow (BM)-derived cells are key players in atherogenesis but whether Ang II induces plaque vulnerability directly through Ang II type 1 receptor (AT1R) activation on...
Inflammation is a key factor in the development of atherosclerosis, a disease characterized by the buildup of plaque in the arteries. COVID-19 infection is known to cause systemic inflammation, but its impact on local plaque vulnerability is unclear....
Pericoronary adipose tissue (PCAT) features on Computed Tomography (CT) have been shown to reflect local inflammation and increased cardiovascular risk. Our goal was to determine whether PCAT radiomics extracted from coronary CT angiography (CCTA) im...
We read with great interest the review by Wang et al. entitled “Identification Markers of Carotid Vulnerable Plaques: An Update”, recently published in Biomolecules [...]
Objective: To compare two lipid-lowering therapy strategies involving Ezetimibe and Alirocumab on the vulnerability of atherosclerotic plaque (AP) in patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS) not achieving the LDL-cholesterol target while on intens...
Historically, cardiovascular prevention has been predominantly focused on stress-induced ischemia, but recent trials have challenged this paradigm, highlighting the emerging role of vulnerable, non-flow-limiting coronary plaques, leading to a shift t...
Assessment and prediction of vulnerable plaque progression and rupture risk are of utmost importance for diagnosis, management and treatment of cardiovascular diseases and possible prevention of acute cardiovascular events such as heart attack and st...
Despite significant strides to mitigate the complications of acute coronary syndrome (ACS), this clinical entity still represents a major global health burden. It has so far been well-established that most of the plaques leading to ACS are not a resu...
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