Methods: It is projected to include about one hundred voluntary adults exhibiting carotid atheromatous lesions requiring a surgical removal. Because of the difficulty to define a pertinent control group, each patient will be his/her own control. In addition to the fragment of pathologic carotid, it will be taken arterial and venous fragments from vessels that are never the seat of atherosclerosis lesions. To reach the best sensitivity, enterovirus RNA will be detected by nested RT-PCR.