The ISIAH (Inherited Stress-Induced Arterial Hypertension) rat strain was developed to study the mechanisms of the stress-induced hypertension and its complications. The ISIAH rats were selected from an outbred Wistar population for a systolic arterial blood pressure (SABP) increase induced by 30 min restraint stress in a small cylindrical wire mesh cage. More than 30 generations of close inbreeding by brother-sister matings resulted in a high genetic homogeneity of the ISIAH strain {Adarichev, 1996 #98}. The ISIAH rats have elevated SABP at basal condition (175.0 ± 3.5 mmHg in males and 165.0 ± 3.0 mmHg in females) and exhibit a dramatic increase in SABP when restrained {Markel, 1992 #3}. The ISIAH rats also show a number of other characteristic features of hypertensive state: hypertrophy of the left ventricle, increase in the wall thickness of the small arteries, and changes in the ECG 
pattern {Markel, 1999 #21}. ISIAH rats are characterized by increased kidney mass {Redina, 2006 #4} and some alterations in kidney histology {Shmerling, 2001 #56}{Yakobson, 2007 #113}. These features, the genetically determined enhanced responsiveness to stressful stimulation, and the predominant involvement of the neuroendocrine hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenocortical and sympathetic adrenal medullary systems during the disease development let to consider the ISIAH rat strain as an advantageous model of the human hypertensive disease {Markel, 2007 #1}.
The ISIAH (Inherited Stress-Induced Arterial Hypertension) rat strain was developed to study the mechanisms of the stress-induced hypertension and its complications. The ISIAH rats were selected from an outbred Wistar population for a systolic arterial blood pressure (SABP) increase induced by 30 min restraint stress in a small cylindrical wire mesh cage. More than 30 generations of close inbreeding by brother-sister matings resulted in a high genetic homogeneity of the ISIAH strain {Adarichev, 1996 #98}. The ISIAH rats have elevated SABP at basal condition (175.0 ± 3.5 mmHg in males and 165.0 ± 3.0 mmHg in females) and exhibit a dramatic increase in SABP when restrained {Markel, 1992 #3}. The ISIAH rats also show a number of other characteristic features of hypertensive state: hypertrophy of the left ventricle, increase in the wall thickness of the small arteries, and changes in the ECG pattern {Markel, 1999 #21}. ISIAH rats are characterized by increased kidney mass {Redina, 2006 #4} and some alterations in kidney histology {Shmerling, 2001 #56}{Yakobson, 2007 #113}. These features, the genetically determined enhanced responsiveness to stressful stimulation, and the predominant involvement of the neuroendocrine hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenocortical and sympathetic adrenal medullary systems during the disease development let to consider the ISIAH rat strain as an advantageous model of the human hypertensive disease {Markel, 2007 #1}.