Topographic patterns of vascular disease: HOX proteins as determining factors?

Figure 1 Map of Hox functional domains in the arterial tree. The schematic shows a rough outline of the main human arterial segments. Localization of vascular defects associated either with mutated human HOX or mouse Hox alleles as indicated at the right were used to generate a cursory map of HOX/Hox activity domains (grey shading) assuming that the defects observed in the mouse map to roughly equivalent anatomic positions in humans. The demarcation of the HOXA4 activity domain is based on down-regulation of HOXA4 expression associated with AAA. The Hoxa9 domain in the thoracic aorta signifies an atherosclerosis-resistant segment.