PYCARD and atherosclerosis: Deficiency of each of the three inflammasome proteins (NLRP3, ASC, Caspase 1) has been shown to reduce atherosclerotic lesion or plaque size [2, 7, 10, 22], and the inflammasome regulates the production and recruitment of monocytes through IL-1β in the early stages of atherosclerosis [15, 31, 35].