Nature Reviews Drug Discovery is pleased to present a collection of reviews on atherothrombosis, the leading cause of morbidity and mortality. As discussed in these articles, recent progress in the understanding of the pathogenesis of atherothrombosis, and in the application of approaches to assess disease progression, has provided new impetus to the discovery and development of novel drugs for this condition.
HDL as a target in the treatment of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease Patrick Linsel-Nitschke & Alan R. Tall The widespread use of statins, which lower levels of LDL cholesterol, has resulted in substantial
progress in the treatment of atherosclerosis. Nevertheless, it seems that there might be limits to
the degree of benefit that can be achieved with statins, which has increased interest in targeting
other risk factors, such as low levels of HDL cholesterol. Linsel-Nitschke and Tall review the
mechanisms that are thought to underlie the protective effect of HDL cholesterol, and discuss
several new molecular targets and strategies for increasing HDL levels. Abstract
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Molecular, cellular and functional imaging of atherothrombosis Robin P. Choudhury, Valentin Fuster & Zahi A. Fayad Our knowledge of the events of atherogenesis has grown significantly in recent years.
Choudhury, Fuster and Fayad describe how increasingly sophisticated techniques for imaging
atherosclerosis and thrombosis will capitalize on these advances in understanding by bringing
forward diagnosis, enhancing disease characterization and providing more precise evaluation
of the effects of drug therapy. Abstract
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Scientific and therapeutic advances in antiplatelet therapy? Deepak L. Bhatt & Eric J. Topol Platelets, which have a key role in haemostasis, have emerged as pivotal entities in
cardiovascular disease over the past decade, and several antiplatelet agents are well
established in the clinic. Bhatt and Topol discuss both recent clinical data on antiplatelet
therapies and novel targets for the development of drugs to inhibit platelet function more
effectively and safely than currently possible. Abstract | Full Text (HTML/ PDF)
Lovastatin and beyond: the history of the HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors Jonathan A. Tobert Following studies in the 1950s and 1960s indicating that elevated plasma cholesterol levels
were a major risk factor for the development of coronary heart disease, HMG-CoA reductase,
the rate-limiting enzyme in cholesterol biosynthesis, became an attractive drug target. Tobert
describes the discovery and development of lovastatin, the first approved HMG-CoA reductase
inhibitor (statin), and the clinical trials that have provided the basis for the widespread use of
statins to reduce morbidity and mortality owing to cardiovascular disease. Abstract
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