Spontaneous Hypertensive Rat Consortium
Do you know of or use the Spontaneous Hypertensive Rat?
The SHR is the most commonly used model of hypertension. The SHR colony was established in 1963 by Kyoto University investigators and has been widely used to understand how hypertension affects all organs of the body and to test new therapeutics to treat this disorder.
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Our recent study uncovered, over the past 60 years, the hearts of the SHRs have naturally adapted to better handle the crippling effects of hypertension. You can read more about our study and what we found by following this link:
https://academic.oup.com/ajh/article-abstract/35/3/264/6380750?redirectedFrom=fulltext&login=false
Do you want to be a part of the next phase of our study?
Presently, we have been working on a large-scale follow-up study to investigate
the precise molecular pathways that have evolved over the past 60 years. We believe that once we have mapped the changes in the molecular pathways, we will understand how these hearts are able to better withstand the effects of hypertension.
How can you help us?
While we have some SHR heart tissues, the more we have, the better our analysis will be.
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We are interested in connecting with other researchers who have heart tissue or blood harvested from SHRs between 1963 and 2005. Samples can be either frozen, freeze dried, or fixed (either in paraffin-embedded blocks or on glass slides).
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If you have these samples and are interested in collaborating with us, we would love to hear from you. Please send us an email at shrconsortium@uoguelph.ca.