CCL2 and diabetes mellitus: These effects result in the stimulation of the synthesis of pro-inflammatory cytokines and chemokines, including interleukin-6 (IL-6), monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 (MCP-1), tumor necrosis factor α (TNFα) and transforming growth factor β (TGF-β) and the overexpression of adhesion molecules, such as vascular cell adhesion molecule (VCAM-1) or intracellular cell adhesion molecule (ICAM-1), exacerbating the atherosclerotic process in diabetes [29,44,45].