DES and Hirschsprung disease: In aganglionic-colon resident smooth muscle cells, significantly lower DES desmin gene expression levels were observed compared to the healthy colon (Table 1 and Fig. 3C) in good correlation with earlier immunofluorescence stainings of human colon samples that showed decreased expression of desmin in the smooth muscle cells of the aganglionic colon segment of HSCR patients (34).