碩士 高雄醫學大學 醫學研究所碩士班 94 According to recent report of the Department of Health, heart and brain vascular disease are the top two and three of the ten major causes of death in Taiwan respectively. Previous studies indicated that hyperhomocysteinemia is one of risk factors for cardiovascular disease. The main cause of cardiovascular disease is atherosclerosis which can be referred to as a chronic inflammatory disease. In the initiation of atherosclerosis, endothelial cells of the blood vessel loss function firstly. Previous studies indicated hyperhomoysteinemia actually induced vascular endothelial cell’s injury, however, the detail molecular mechanisms were not well understood. Our recent study showed at pathophysiologic concentrations, homocysteine would activate human monocyte and induce cytokine expression. The present study was designed to explore the effects of homocysteine on human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) focusing on the cell viability, cell cycle regulation, and adhesion molecules expres