We also measured the mRNA level of chemokine receptors including CCR2, CCR5, and CX3CR1, which have been implicated in monocyte transmigration and atherosclerosis (CombadièRe et al., 2008; Tacke et al., 2007), and cell migration‐related genes including MMP2, MMP12 (Chen & Parks, 2009), TGFβ1, and VEGFc (Simpson et al., 2008) in migrated monocytes. Here, CCR2 is linked to atherosclerosis.