We reasoned that the immediate early response genes may be playing a role in the hypertrophic phenotype for several reasons: 1) the immediate early response genes are rapidly altered in response to cardiac stress [8], [47], [48]; 2) perturbation of the immediate early response alters cardiac hypertrophy [49], [50]; and 3) immediate early genes are typically SRF-dependent, and the cardiac abnormalities in the miR-499 transgenic partially resembled that of mice where SRF was temporally deleted [51]. The gene discussed is SRF; the disease is cardiac hypertrophy.