Natural Genetic Variation of Integrin Alpha L (Itgal) Modulates Ischemic Brain Injury in Stroke

During ischemic stroke, occlusion of the cerebrovasculature causes neuronal cell death (infarction), but naturally occurring genetic factors modulating infarction have been difficult to identify in human populations. In a surgically induced mouse model of ischemic stroke, we have previously mapped Civq1 to distal chromosome 7 as a quantitative trait locus determining infarct volume. In this study, genome-wide association mapping using 32 inbred...