Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 2, 2026
The Analysis of Neurovascular Remodeling in Entorhino-hippocampal Organotypic Slice Cultures
Published on: October 23, 2014
Influence of vascular endothelial growth factor variation on human hippocampus morphology
Hilary P Blumberg1, Fei Wang1, Lara G Chepenik1
1Department of Psychiatry, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut; Veterans Affairs Connecticut Healthcare System, West Haven, Connecticut.
Background:
Morphological abnormalities in hippocampus have been implicated in neuropsychiatric disorders, including depression, schizophrenia, and dementia. Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) has been demonstrated to have neurogenic effects in the hippocampus in rats. However, influence of VEGF variation on hippocampus morphology in humans has yet to be shown. Here, an integrated genetic and neuroimaging approach was used to investigate whether VEGF variation influences hippocampus morphology in humans.
Methods:
High-resolution magnetic resonance imaging and voxel-based morphometry were used to identify the influence of genetic variation of VEGFA [rs833068 (SNP-1), rs833070 (SNP-2), rs2146323 (SNP-3) and rs3025020 (SNP-4)] on brain morphology in 47 healthy individuals.
Results:
Variation in VEGFA SNP-2 and SNP-3 showed significant effects on hippocampus concentration.
Conclusions:
The findings suggest that effects of VEGF in hippocampus found in rats extend to humans; further understanding of effects of VEGFA variation might have important implications in identifying individuals more vulnerable to hippocampus pathology as well as those neuropsychiatric populations most likely to benefit from VEGF-mediated interventions.
