The zinc transporter, ZIP12, regulates the pulmonary vascular response to chronic hypoxia Lan Zhao1†*, Eduardo Oliver1*, Klio Maratou4, Santosh S. Atanur4, Olivier D. Dubois1, Emanuele Cotroneo1, Chien-Nien Chen1, Lei Wang1, Cristina Arce1, Pauline L. Chabosseau4, Joan Ponsa-Cobas3, Maria G. Frid7, Benjamin Moyon5, Zoe Webster5, Almaz Aldashev6, Jorge Ferrer3, Guy A. Rutter2, Kurt R. Stenmark7, Timothy J. Aitman4, 8, Martin R. Wilkins1 1 Centre for Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Division of Experimental Medicine, 2 Section of Cell Biology and Functional Genomics, Division of Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism, and 3 Section of Epigenomics and Disease, Department of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Imperial College London, Hammersmith Hospital, London W12 0NN, United Kingdom. 4 Physiological Genomics and Medicine Group and 5 Transgenics and Embryonic Stem Cell Laboratory, Medical Research Council Clinical Sciences Centre, Hammersmith Hospital, London W12 0NN, United Kingdom. 6 Institute of Molecular Biology and Medicine, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. 7 Department of Pediatrics and Medicine, Division of Critical Care Medicine and Cardiovascular Pulmonary Research Laboratories, University of Colorado Denver, Denver, CO, United States. 8 Current address: Centre for Genomic and Experimental Medicine, University of Edinburgh, EH4 2XU, United Kingdom.* These authors contributed equally to this work. †Corresponding author: Dr Lan Zhao. Centre for Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Experimental Medicine, Imperial College London, Hammersmith Hospital, Du Cane Road, London W12 0NN, UK. Telephone: 44-(0) 20 7594 6823; e-mail:
[email protected] 1 The typical response of the adult mammalian pulmonary circulation to a low oxygen environment is vasoconstriction and structural remodelling of pulmonary arterioles, leading to chronic elevation of pulmonary artery pressure (pulmonary hypertension) and right ventricular hypertrophy.