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Context: Epicardial adipose tissue (EAT) is a visceral adipose tissue in close contact with coronary vessels, the excess of which is associated with coronary artery disease (CAD).

Objective: Our goal was to identify candidate molecule(s) characterizing EAT that could intervene in the pathogenesis of CAD.

Design: An approach combining microarrays and bioinformatic sequence analysis tools for predicting secreted proteins (TargetP) was applied to paired biopsies of sc adipose tissue (SAT) and EAT, obtained from patients with or without CAD (NCAD). Results were validated in three independent groups of subjects by quantitative RT-PCR, Western blot, immunohistochemistry, and explant secretion.

Results: Secretory type II phospholipase A2 (sPLA2-IIA) ranked as the highest gene coding for potentially secreted proteins with the highest overexpression in EAT in both CAD …