Analysis of age-related vascular gene expression in mice

Analyses of the age-related changes that occur at a gene expression level and transcriptional profile have not been elucidated in depth. To determine the changes of the vascular transcriptome, we conducted gene expression microarray experiments on aortas of adult and old mice, in which age-related vascular dysfunction was confirmed by increased stiffness and associated systolic hypertension C57BL/6 mice obtained from Janvier (Saint Berthevin, France) were aged 6 months (n=6) and 20 (n=6) months and water and standard rodent chow were fed ad libitum. Briefly, the vessel was flushed thoroughly with ice-cold phosphate-buffered saline (PBS), through the left ventricle of the heart, cleaned of periadventitial fat and connective tissues, and snap-frozen in liquid nitrogen and stored at -80 °C.