When studying the cardiac effects of IRF8, Jiang and coworkers observed a reduction in cardiac IRF8 protein levels in the hearts of humans with dilated cardiomyopathy or hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, mice with pressure overload caused by aortic banding, and in neonatal rat cardiomyocytes incubated with angiotensin II or phenylephrine (134). Here, IRF8 is linked to dilated cardiomyopathy.