ELN and Hypertension: Hypertension is normally associated with protective ECM remodeling (largely regulated by vascular smooth muscle cells [VSMCs]), including upregulation of ECM cross-linking genes (e.g. lox, loxl1, loxl4), elastin and elastin-associated genes (e.g. eln, fbn1), and some collagens (e.g. Col1a1, Col3a1, Col 8a1).