ABSTRACT
Until recently, little was known about the transcription factors that are necessary for regulating vascular development, endothelial differentiation, and endothelial-specific gene expression. This is in sharp contrast to other developmental processes such as hematopoiesis and myogenesis where several cell or tissue-specific transcription factors have been identified. Progress in elucidating the molecular mechanisms underlying the transcriptional control of vascular development has lagged considerably, in large part due to the fact that the model systems for studying blood vessel development are more limited. The identification of several vascular-specific genes involved in vasculogenesis and evaluation of the genomic regulatory regions required for directing their expression over the past decade has facilitated the identification of the transcriptional mechanisms required for vascular-specific gene expression. Vascular defects associated with targeted disruption of genes encoding additional transcription factors, previously unsuspected to be involved in regulating vascular-specific gene expression, have also led to the identification of role for these factors in vascular development or vascular-specific gene expression. The purpose of this chapter is to summarize the recent approaches and advances made in our understanding of the transcriptional regulation of vascular development, angiogenesis, and vascular-specific gene expression.
