This paper is only available as a PDF. To read, Please Download here.
Abstract
Homocysteine is an independent risk factor for peripheral vascular and coronary artery
disease. The exact mechanism by which homocysteine promotes vascular dysfunction is
unclear, but it is speculated to involve oxidative stress. Several studies have investigated
the role of homocysteine in promoting oxidative stress and have obtained conflicting
results. The age and gender of the subject populations in these studies may have influenced
the outcome. Therefore, we investigated whether plasma homocysteine concentrations
were correlated with plasma malondialdehyde (MDA, a marker of oxidative stress), and
if the subject's age and gender affected this correlation. Plasma homocysteine and
MDA were measured in 35 premenopausal women, 14 young men, 38 postmenopausal women,
and 18 older men. Homocysteine was significantly higher in men than women (P [lt ] .01) and in older subjects versus younger. However, MDA was significantly greater
only in the young men (P [lt ] .01). Furthermore, there was a significant correlation between homocysteine
and MDA only in these young men (R2 = 0.50, P [lt ] .01). Lastly, subjects undergoing a methionine load did not exhibit increased
MDA despite significant increases in homocysteine. Since oxidative stress correlates
with basal homocysteine only in young men and does not increase with acutely increased
homocysteine, it is unlikely to be the result of a direct effect of homocysteine.
To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
Purchase one-time access:
Academic & Personal: 24 hour online accessCorporate R&D Professionals: 24 hour online accessOne-time access price info
- For academic or personal research use, select 'Academic and Personal'
- For corporate R&D use, select 'Corporate R&D Professionals'
Subscribe:
Subscribe to Metabolism - Clinical and ExperimentalAlready a print subscriber? Claim online access
Already an online subscriber? Sign in
Register: Create an account
Institutional Access: Sign in to ScienceDirect
Article info
Footnotes
☆Supported by National Institutes of Health Grant No. RO1 HD36110-02 and NRSA Fellowship No. 1 F32 HD08310-01.
Identification
Copyright
© 2002 Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
