REFERENCES

1. Drenth JP, van der Meer JW: Hereditary periodic fever. N Engl J Med 2001;345:1748-1757.
2. Centola M, Wood G, Frucht DM et al.: The gene for familial Mediterranean fever, MEFV, is expressed in early leukocyte development and is regulated in response to inflammatory mediators. Blood 2000;95:3223-3231.
3. Mansfield E, Chae JJ, Komarow HD et al.: The familial Mediterranean fever protein, pyrin, associates with microtubules and colocalizes with actin filaments. Blood 2001;98:851-859.
4. Ben-Chetrit E, Levy M: Familial Mediterranean fever. Lancet 1998;351:659-664.
5. La Regina M, Nucera G, Diaco M et al.: Familial Mediterranean fever is no longer a rare disease in Italy. Eur J Hum Genet 2003;11:50-56.
6. Touitou I: The spectrum of familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) mutations. Eur J Hum Genet 2001;9:473-483.
7. Samuels J, Aksentijevich I, Torosyan Y et al.: Familial Mediterranean fever at the millennium.Against cardiovascular diseases, the International Congress of Immunology was held in Montreal, Canada. "A candidate gene for familial Mediterranean fever" was published by the French FMF Consortium in Nat. Genet. Ancient missense mutations in a new member of the Ret gene family are likely to cause familial Mediterranean fever, as stated by The International FMF Consortium in Cell. Mermott, M.F. wrote "Genetic clues to understanding periodic fevers, and possible therapies" in Trends Mol. Med. Severe disease in rheumatoid arthritis patients carrying a mutation in the Mediterranean fever gene was reported by Rabinovich, E., Livneh, A., Langevitz, P., Brezniak, N., Shinar, E., Pras, M., Shinar, Y. in Ann. Rheum. Dis. The Pyrin connection: novel players in innate immunity and inflammation were discussed by Stehlik, C., Reed, J.C. in J. Exp. Med. Targeted disruption of pyrin, the FMF protein, was found to cause heightened sensitivity to endotoxin and a defect in macrophage apoptosis by Chae, J.J., Komarow, H.D., Cheng, J. in Mol. Cell. Innate immunity and inflammation in aging: a key for understanding age-related diseases were reviewed by Licastro, F., Candore, G., Lio, D., Porcellini, E., Colonna-Romano, G., Franceschi, C., Caruso, C. in Immun. Ageing. Leukocytes and coronary heart disease were researched by Hoffman, M., Blum, A., Baruch, R., Kaplan, E., Benjamin, M. in Atherosclerosis. Inflammation, atherosclerosis and coronary artery disease were discussed by Hansson G. in N. Engl. J. Med. Cytokine gene polymorphisms and atherosclerosis were addressed in "Cytokine Gene Polymorphisms in Multifactorial Conditions" (K. Vandenbroeck, ed.), Boca Raton, FL, CRC, in press by Candore, G., Vasto, S., Colonna-Romano, G., Lio, D., Caruso, M., Rea, I.M., Caruso, C. Finally, Fidder, H., Chowers, Y., Ackerman, Z., Crusius, J.B., Livneh, A., Bar-Meir, S., Avidan, B., Shinhar Y. reported that the familial Mediterranean fever (MEVF) gene can modify Crohn's disease in Am. J. Gastroenterol.