Duvall Craig L, Taylor W Robert, Weiss Daiana, Guldberg Robert E
Wallace H Couler Department of Biomedical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA.
Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol. 2004 Jul;287(1):H302-10. doi: 10.1152/ajpheart.00928.2003. Epub 2004 Mar 11.
Transgenic mouse models are increasingly being used to investigate the functions of specific growth factors or matrix proteins to design therapeutic strategies for controlling blood vessel growth. However, the available methodologies for evaluating angiogenesis and arteriogenesis in these models are limited by animal size, user subjectivity, the power to visualize the three-dimensional vessel networks, or the capability to employ a vigorous quantitative analysis. In this study, we employed contrast-enhanced microcomputed tomography imaging to assess collateral development after induction of hindlimb ischemia in the mouse. The morphological parameters vessel volume, connectivity, number, thickness, thickness distribution, separation, and degree of anisotropy were evaluated in control and surgery limbs 0, 3, and 14 days postsurgery. Results indicate that the vascular volume of the surgically manipulated limb was reconstituted as early as 3 days after femoral artery excision through development of a series of highly connected, small caliber, closely spaced, and isotropically oriented collateral vessels. Parametric analyses were completed to assess the sensitivity of the calculated morphological parameters to variations in image binarization threshold and voxel size. Images taken at the 36-microm voxel size were found to be optimal for evaluating collateral vessel formation, whereas 8- to 16-microm voxel sizes were needed to resolve smaller vascular structures. This study demonstrates the utility of microcomputed tomography as a robust method for quantitative, three-dimensional analysis of blood vessel networks. Whereas these initial efforts focused on the mouse hindlimb ischemia model, the developed techniques may be applied to a variety of model systems to investigate mechanisms of angiogenesis and arteriogenesis.
转基因小鼠模型越来越多地被用于研究特定生长因子或基质蛋白的功能,以设计控制血管生长的治疗策略。然而,在这些模型中评估血管生成和动脉生成的现有方法受到动物大小、用户主观性、可视化三维血管网络的能力或进行有力定量分析的能力的限制。在本研究中,我们采用对比增强微型计算机断层扫描成像来评估小鼠后肢缺血诱导后的侧支血管发育。在术后0、3和14天,对对照肢体和手术肢体的形态学参数血管体积、连通性、数量、厚度、厚度分布、间距和各向异性程度进行了评估。结果表明,通过一系列高度连通、小口径、紧密间隔且各向同性排列的侧支血管的发育,手术操作肢体的血管体积早在股动脉切除后3天就得到了重建。完成了参数分析,以评估计算出的形态学参数对图像二值化阈值和体素大小变化的敏感性。发现以36微米体素大小拍摄的图像最适合评估侧支血管形成,而需要8至16微米的体素大小来分辨较小的血管结构。这项研究证明了微型计算机断层扫描作为一种强大的方法用于血管网络定量三维分析的实用性。虽然这些初步努力集中在小鼠后肢缺血模型上,但所开发的技术可能适用于各种模型系统,以研究血管生成和动脉生成的机制。