14 DAY TRIAL // Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh announce the development of a new approach to promoting the regrowth of human blood vessels that are affected during a wide range of heart conditions. The team here says that a single molecule is capable of boosting the growth of these vessels.
The nerve growth factor was famously discovered decades ago, and even won its finder a Nobel Prize more than 30 years ago. Ever since, scientists have been looking for way of translating this amazing discovery into clinical applications.
Expert Yadong Wang, a professor at the Pitts Swanson School of Engineering's Department of Bioengineering, was the leader of the research. He is also a professor at the Pitts School of Medicine's Department of Surgery, and an affiliate of the Pitt-UPMC McGowan Institute of Regenerative Medicine (MIRM).
He and his team published the results of their discoveries in the August 1 early online issue of the esteemed journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). Wang says that this study could contribute to preventing or treating heart diseases.
In the Western world, heart diseases are the leading cause of death, with millions of people dying as a result every single year. In many cases, blood vessels are significantly damages, and blood flow to and from the heart is hampered.
After researchers developed the growth factor compound, they used unsuspecting lab mice to test the chemical. Much to the amazement of the team, the test animals exhibited significant levels of blood vessel growth.
“We had structures that resembled arterioles – small arteries that lead to a network of capillaries,” Wang explains. Experts were only expecting to see tiny capillaries, but were excited to see larger blood vessels as well.
A single injection using the growth hormone led to the development of blood vessels, which were able to endure for at least a month. “They are very potent molecules,” Wang says of the growth factor chemicals.
When it comes to treating heart diseases, the new approach could be done in a minimally-invasive manner. What this means is that drips loaded with the growth factor heparin could be administered through catheters directly to the chest of patients.
This means that surgeons will no longer have to open sufferers up, and operated directly on the heart. The damage that a catheter does to healthy tissue is minimal, and the benefits this approach carries far outweigh the benefits.
“After a heart attack, the muscle is dead, and what's replacing it is scar tissue – a lot of collagen, but not many cardiac muscle cells. No muscle, no contraction,” the Pitts team leader explains.
“If we can use growth factors to reverse that kind of adverse remodeling process, then we can probably rescue the heart function, which is the most important thing,” Wang concludes.