FGF2 and cardiac hypertrophy: The potential of FGF-2 to induce cardiac hypertrophy was first inferred from in vitro studies in which FGF-2 provoked fetal contractile protein gene expression, including upregulation of β-MHC and α-skeletal actin in association with downregulation of α-MHC, which is characteristic of pressure-overload hypertrophy in cultured neonatal rat cardiac myocytes [24, 25].