Human Gene Set: KEGG_VASCULAR_SMOOTH_MUSCLE_CONTRACTION


Standard name KEGG_VASCULAR_SMOOTH_MUSCLE_CONTRACTION
Systematic name M9387
Brief description Vascular smooth muscle contraction
Full description or abstract The vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) is a highly specialized cell whose principal function is contraction. On contraction, VSMCs shorten, thereby decreasing the diameter of a blood vessel to regulate the blood flow and pressure. The principal mechanisms that regulate the contractile state of VSMCs are changes in cytosolic Ca2+ concentration (c). In response to vasoconstrictor stimuli, Ca2+ is mobilized from intracellular stores and/or the extracellular space to increase c in VSMCs. The increase in c, in turn, activates the Ca2+-CaM-MLCK pathway and stimulates MLC20 phosphorylation, leading to myosin-actin interactions and, hence, the development of contractile force. The sensitivity of contractile myofilaments or MLC20 phosphorylation to Ca2+ can be secondarily modulated by other signaling pathways. During receptor stimulation, the contractile force is greatly enhanced by the inhibition of myosin phosphatase. Rho/Rho kinase, PKC, and arachidonic acid have been proposed to play a pivotal role in this enhancement. The signaling events that mediate relaxation include the removal of a contractile agonist (passive relaxation) and activation of cyclic nucleotide-dependent signaling pathways in the continued presence of a contractile agonist (active relaxation). Active relaxation occurs through the inhibition of both Ca2+ mobilization and myofilament Ca2+ sensitivity in VSMCs.
Collection C2: Curated
      CP: Canonical Pathways
            CP:KEGG_LEGACY: KEGG Legacy Pathways
Source publication  
Exact source hsa04270
Related gene sets  
External links http://www.genome.jp/kegg/pathway/hsa/hsa04270.html
Filtered by similarity ?
Source species Homo sapiens
Contributed by KEGG (Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes)
Source platform or
identifier namespace		 Human_NCBI_Gene_ID
Dataset references  
Download gene set format: grp | gmt | xml | json | TSV metadata
Compute overlaps ? (show collections to investigate for overlap with this gene set)
Compendia expression profiles ? NG-CHM interactive heatmaps
(Please note that clustering takes a few seconds)
GTEx compendium
Human tissue compendium (Novartis)
Global Cancer Map (Broad Institute)
NCI-60 cell lines (National Cancer Institute)

Legacy heatmaps (PNG)
GTEx compendium
Human tissue compendium (Novartis)
Global Cancer Map (Broad Institute)
NCI-60 cell lines (National Cancer Institute)
Advanced query Further investigate these 115 genes
Gene families ? Categorize these 115 genes by gene family
Show members (show 115 source identifiers mapped to 115 genes)
Version history  

See MSigDB license terms here. Please note that certain gene sets have special access terms.