Together with modified LDL, infection of macrophages with P. gingivalis facilitates the formation of foam cells, and the fimbriae of P. gingivalis are required to adhere and enter the macrophages.40 However, in this study, deficiency of fimbriae did not affect the proteolysis of apoB or apoE because fragments were visualized in 2DE of LDL/VLDL from whole blood treated with P. gingivalis mutants deficient in major (DPG3) or minor (KRX178) fimbriae (J. Lönn, S. Ljunggren, T. Bengtsson and H. Karlsson, unpublished observations). The gene discussed is APOE; the disease is infection.