Dynamics of cardiac wound healing following myocardial infarction: observations in genetically altered mice

Recent improvements in the clinical management of acute myocardial infarcti on (MI) have resulted in a dramatic decrease in mortality because of this c ondition. This implies that more patients enter the process of infarct heal ing. This is a highly complex cascade of events which, although studied for decades, is still not completely understood. An increasing number of genet ically altered mice can now be studied in a mouse model of MI, to investiga te the contribution of the product of the targeted gene to the infarct heal ing process. In this review, we will discuss the defects in infarct healing that have been observed in null mutants for plasminogen, urokinase-type pl asminogen activator (u-PA), matrix metalloproteinases (MMPS), thrombospondi n-2 and dishevelled-1. These studies provide new insights in the infarct he aling process itself, but may also help to define new diagnostic and therap eutic targets in humans suffering from MI.