Mice Bred for High Cholesterol May Help Speed Heart Disease Research

Scientists said Thursday they had created a genetically engineered mouse that rapidly develops high levels of artery-hardening cholesterol--an advance that should speed heart disease research.

The mice accumulate blood cholesterol levels five times higher than normal even when fed regular diets and their arteries rapidly narrow with fatty deposits, condensing into four months a process that takes 40 years in humans.

“When I first examined aortas from these mice under the microscope, I got so excited my hands were shaking,” said Robert Reddick, a pathology professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who worked on the discovery.

The researchers published their findings today in Science magazine.

Because the mice reproduce quickly, are easy to work with and inexpensive, they provide the first practical animal model for research into treatments for strokes and heart disease, which is the leading cause of death in the United States.

The mice will be prime models for examining the effects and possible benefits of diet on cholesterol levels, genetic factors affecting heart disease and new drugs.

“This . . . should quicken the pace of research and increase by leaps and bounds our understanding of . . . diseases such as hypertension,” said Claude Lenfant, director of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, which helped fund the study.