Use vascular endothelial growth factor 164 (VEGF-164) to stimulate inflammation, ICAM-1 expression on endothelial cells, and chemotaxis of monocytes (Usui et al. Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci, 2004). VEGF binds to FLT1 (VEGFR-1) and KDR (VEGFR-2), and activates Raf/MEK/ERK and PI3K/AKT pathways (Ferrara et al. Nat Med, 2003). VEGF plays an important role in neurogenesis both in vitro and in vivo (Storkebaum et al. Bioassays, 2004) and it promotes growth and survival of dopaminergic neurons and astrocytes. VEGF also promotes growth and survival of vascular endothelial cells, monocyte chemotaxis, and colony formation by granulocyte-macrophage progenitor cells (Ferrara et al.). Mouse recombinant VEGF-164 from STEMCELL comes lyophilized with ≥ 95% purity; EC50 ≤ 6 ng/mL; endotoxin levels verified ≤ 1 EU/μg protein. Alternative names: MGC70609, MVCD-1, Vascular endothelial growth factor 2, Vascular endothelial growth factor A, Vascular permeability factor, Vasculotropin, VEGFA, VPF.