Omics-based approaches to understand mechanosensitive endothelial biology and atherosclerosis

Atherosclerosis is a multifactorial disease that preferentially occurs in arterial regions exposed to d‐flow can be used to indicate disturbed flow or disturbed blood flow. The mechanisms by which d‐flow induces atherosclerosis involve changes in the transcriptome, methylome, proteome, and metabolome of multiple vascular cells, especially endothelial cells. Initially, we begin with the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis and the changes that occur at multiple levels owing to d‐flow, especially in the endothelium. Also, there are a variety of strategies used for the global profiling of the genome, transcriptome, miRNA‐ome, DNA methylome, and metabolome that are important to define the biological and pathophysiological mechanisms of endothelial dysfunction and atherosclerosis. Finally, systems biology can be used to integrate these ‘omics’ datasets, especially those that derive data based on a single animal model, in order to better understand the pathophysiology of atherosclerosis development in a holistic manner and how this integrative approach could be used to identify novel molecular diagnostics and therapeutic targets to prevent or treat atherosclerosis. WIREs Syst Biol Med 2016, 8:378–401. doi: 10.1002/wsbm.1344 This article is categorized under: Models of Systems Properties and Processes > Organismal Models Biological Mechanisms > Regulatory Biology Translational, Genomic, and Systems Medicine > Therapeutic Methods