RANTES (regulated on activation, normal T cell expressed and secreted) is a chemokine implicated in atherosclerosis. Increasing evidence supports the involvement of inflammation in the initiation and progression of atherosclerosis. Chemotactic cytokines or chemokines are small heparin-binding proteins that play a critical role in the inflammatory process by directing the migration of circulating leukocytes to sites of inflammation or injury. They are classified into 4 major groups, according to the arrangement of the conserved cysteine (C) residues in the mature proteins. CC chemokines, which have the first 2 conserved cysteine residues adjacent to each other, constitute the largest family of chemokines. They tend to attract mononuclear cells and are found at sites of chronic inflammation.
CCL5 or RANTES (regulated on activation, normal T-cell expressed and secreted) is a CC chemokine that is stored in the alpha granules of platelets and that can be rapidly released after platelet activation. After release from activated platelets, it can subsequently be deposited on inflamed or atherosclerotic endothelium and has been shown to mediate transmigration and shear-resistant arrest of monocytes onto activated endothelium.
In addition, RANTES is highly expressed within atheroma.
For these reasons, RANTES has been implicated in the genesis of atherosclerosis. Despite this, however, data regarding the significance of plasma RANTES levels in coronary artery disease (CAD) have been sparse and somewhat conflicting. On the one hand, RANTES levels in patients with acute coronary syndromes have been demonstrated to be elevated, whereas levels in stable CAD have been shown to be downregulated. In addition, gene polymorphisms that would be expected to result in reduced levels of RANTES have been shown to be associated with adverse cardiac events in a stable but high-risk population. These observations raise the possibility that RANTES levels may have divergent implications in stable versus unstable CAD patients. To date, there have been no studies which have specifically looked at the prognostic value of baseline plasma RANTES levels in patients with known or suspected CAD. This is in contrast to other chemokines, such as IL-8 and MCP-1, which have also been associated with atherosclerosis and whose levels have been demonstrated to be prognostically significant.
Resources:
Cavusoglu E, Eng C, Chopra V, Clark LT, Pinsky DJ, Marmur JD. Low plasma RANTES levels are an independent predictor of cardiac mortality in patients referred for coronary angiography. Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol. 2007 Apr;27(4):929-35. doi: 10.1161/01.ATV.0000258789.21585.76. Epub 2007 Jan 25. PMID: 17255538.
Tang P, Chong L, Li X, Liu Y, Liu P, Hou C, Li R. Correlation between serum RANTES levels and the severity of Parkinson's disease. Oxid Med Cell Longev. 2014;2014:208408. doi: 10.1155/2014/208408. Epub 2014 Dec 22. PMID: 25587378; PMCID: PMC4283268.
Fonteh CN, Palestine AG, Wagner BD, Patnaik JL, Mathias MT, Manoharan N, Mandava N, Baldermann R, De Carlo T, Lynch AM; University of Colorado Retina Research Group. RANTES (CCL5) in Patients With Geographic Atrophy Age-Related Macular Degeneration. Transl Vis Sci Technol. 2023 Jan 3;12(1):19. doi: 10.1167/tvst.12.1.19. PMID: 36633873; PMCID: PMC9840441.
RANTES
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