Gu SX, Sonkar VK, Katare PB, et al. - Given hyperhomocysteinemia confers risk for ischemic stroke but there is a lack of a targeted treatment strategy, in part, due to limited knowledge of the causal role of homocysteine in cerebrovascular pathogenesis, so, researchers investigated whether a rise in plasma total homocysteine exacerbates cerebrovascular injury and if memantine (a N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor antagonist) is protective. They used a genetic model of cystathionine beta synthase deficiency to test this. This work affords experimental evidence that cerebrovascular injury can be exacerbated by even a mild rise in plasma total homocysteine. Also, the likely utility of N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor antagonism was suggested as a strategy to avert reperfusion injury following acute ischemic stroke in patients with mild hyperhomocysteinemia.