BCL2 and diabetic cardiomyopathy: We observed overexpression of the pro-apoptotic Bax gene, downexpression of the anti-apoptotic Bcl2 gene as well as overexpression of the ICAM1 gene expression, indicating increased apoptosis in STZ-diabetic myocardium, and being consistent with several previous reports implicating cardiomyocyte apoptosis in the pathogenesis of diabetic cardiomyopathy.8,9Bax is one of the regulatory molecules in the apoptotic pathway acting as a pro-apoptotic protein.