These results suggest that loss of CDKN2B may not only promote cardiovascular disease through the development of atherosclerosis but may also impair TGFβ signaling and hypoxic neovessel maturation.
Together, these data suggest that loss of CDKN2B promotes atherosclerosis by increasing the size and complexity of the lipid-laden necrotic core through impaired efferocytosis.
Among genes regulated by 9p21 risk variants, CDKN2B appears to play a significant role in the regulation of SAT expandability, which is a strong determinant of lipotoxicity and therefore might contribute to the development of atherosclerosis.
Although this locus encodes three well-characterized tumor suppressors, p16(INK4a), p15(INK4b), and ARF, the SNPs most strongly associated with ASVD are ∼120 kb from the nearest coding gene within a long non-coding RNA (ncRNA) known as ANRIL (CDKN2BAS).