From the July 2003 Scientific American Magazine | 2 comments

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An academic experiment leads to a new class of drug for attacking heart disease

By Gary Stix

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July
2003 Issue
Skeptic Bottled Twaddle
News Scan Frozen Stars
Antigravity The Yanked Clippers
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In the early 1990s the root causes of atherosclerosis had started to become clearer. Emerging research showed that the disease bore a direct relation to inflammation triggered by lipoproteins and other agents that spurred growth of atherosclerotic deposits.

Taking note of these discoveries, clinical researchers had begun to mull how they could intervene to block this process. Two professors at the Emory University School of Medicine--Russell M. Medford and R. Wayne Alexander, both cardiologists and biologists--were intrigued by findings that tied inflammation to oxidants, molecules that strip electrons from other molecules.

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