cells Review Atherothrombosis in Acute Coronary Syndromes—From Mechanistic Insights to Targeted Therapies Chinmay Khandkar 1,2, Mahesh V. Madhavan 3,4, James C. Weaver 2,5,6, David S. Celermajer 2,5,6 and Keyvan Karimi Galougahi 2,5,6,* 1 Department of Cardiology, Orange Base Hospital, Orange, NSW 2800, Australia;
[email protected] 2 Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2008, Australia;
[email protected] (J.C.W.);
[email protected] (D.S.C.) 3 New York Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Irving Medical Center, New York, NY 10032, USA;
[email protected] 4 Clinical Trials Center, Cardiovascular Research Foundation, New York, NY 10019, USA 5 Department of Cardiology, Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney, NSW 2050, Australia 6 Heart Research Institute, Sydney, NSW 2042, Australia * Correspondence:
[email protected]; Tel.: +61-2-8208-8900; Fax: +61-2-8208-8909 Abstract: The atherothrombotic substrates for acute coronary syndromes (ACS) consist of plaque ruptures, erosions and calcified nodules, while the non-atherothrombotic etiologies, such as sponta- neous coronary artery dissection, coronary artery spasm and coronary embolism are the rarer causes of ACS. The purpose of this comprehensive review is to (1) summarize the histopathologic insights into the atherothrombotic plaque subtypes in acute ACS from postmortem studies; (2) provide a brief overview of atherogenesis, while mainly focusing on the events that lead to plaque destabilization Citation: Khandkar, C.; Madhavan, and disruption; (3) summarize mechanistic data from clinical studies that have used intravascular M.V.; Weaver, J.C.; Celermajer, D.S.; imaging, including high-resolution optical coherence tomography, to assess culprit plaque morphol- Karimi Galougahi, K.