Abstract
Particularly interesting new cys-his rich protein (PINCH), as an adaptor protein, regulates matrix deposition, cell proliferation, invasion, and metastasis. PINCH plays an important role for tumorigenesis and progression. However, the contributions of PINCH to intracranial aneurysms (IA) remain largely unknown. In our study, we demonstrated that PINCH expression was significantly increased in IA samples compared with healthy controls. The size of IA had a remarkable correlation with PINCH expression. However, PINCH expression had no obvious difference among different Hunt-Hess grades. In addition, the expressions of MMP-2 and MMP-9 were significantly increased in IA tissues compared with healthy controls; moreover, PINCH expression in IA tissues was significantly correlated with MMP-2 and MMP-9 expression. In conclusion, these results suggest that PINCH might play a role similar to MMP-2 and MMP-9 in the pathogenesis of IA. PINCH might be a risk factor for growth of unruptured IA, and this might be a target for diagnosis and therapy of IA.