Zebrafish models of cardiovascular diseases and their applications in herbal medicine research.
The zebrafish (Danio rerio) has recently become a powerful animal model for cardiovascular research and drug discovery due to its ease of maintenance, genetic manipulability and ability for high-throughput screening. Recent advances in imaging techniques and generation of transgenic zebrafish have greatly facilitated in vivo analysis of cellular events of cardiovascular development and pathogenesis. More importantly, recent studies have demonstrated the functional similarity of drug metabolism systems between zebrafish and humans, highlighting the clinical relevance of employing zebrafish in identifying lead compounds in Chinese herbal medicine with potential beneficial cardiovascular effects. This paper seeks to summarise the scope of zebrafish models employed in cardiovascular studies and the application of these research models in Chinese herbal medicine to date.
National Institute of Complementary Medicine, Western Sydney University, Campbelltown, NSW, Australia.
Sai-Wang
SW
Seto
Faculty of Medicine, University of New South Wales, NSW, Australia; School of Medicine, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW, Australia; Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Macquarie University, NSW, Australia.
Hosen
H
Kiat
State Key Laboratory Research in Chinese Medicine and Institute of Chinese Medical Sciences, University of Macau, Macao, China.
Simon M Y
SM
Lee
National Institute of Complementary Medicine, Western Sydney University, Campbelltown, NSW, Australia.
Alan
A
Bensoussan
National Institute of Complementary Medicine, Western Sydney University, Campbelltown, NSW, Australia.
Yu-Ting
YT
Sun
State Key Laboratory Research in Chinese Medicine and Institute of Chinese Medical Sciences, University of Macau, Macao, China.
Maggie P M
MP
Hoi
National Institute of Complementary Medicine, Western Sydney University, Campbelltown, NSW, Australia. Electronic address: d.chang@uws.edu.au.
Dennis
D
Chang
D000818:Animals; D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000503:physiopathology; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D055808:Drug Discovery / Q000379:methods*; D029001:Herbal Medicine / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D015027:Zebrafish
Animal model; Cardiovascular; Chinese herbal medicine; Review; Zebrafish