Furthermore, a recent study that used Myh11-CreERT2 ROSA floxed STOP eYFP Apoe−/− mice for SMC lineage tracing showed that >80% of SMCs within advanced atherosclerotic lesions are phenotypically modulated and that traditional methods for detecting SMCs based on immunostaining for SMC markers fail to detect >80% of SMC-derived cells within advanced atherosclerotic lesions, indicating that the contribution of SMCs to atherosclerotic plaques has been greatly underestimated by conventional techniques [13]. This evidence concerns the gene APOE and Atherosclerotic lesion.