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The University of Murcia (UMU) collaborates in an international study led by the University of Harvard (USA) in the description of a new mechanism to stop thrombosis and find therapeutic targets for the development of new drugs.
According to a report by the World Health Organization (WHO), thrombosis is one of the leading causes of death in the world.
A thrombus involves the formation of a clot inside a blood vessel, which can prevent the proper irrigation of organs.
When it happens in an artery it can affect the heart (myocardial infarction) or the brain (stroke), whereas when it occurs in a vein it affects mainly the legs, with the risk of developing a pulmonary thromboembolism.
This study, published in the Journal of Thrombosis and Hemostasis, provides new evidence on the mechanisms by which the protein PDI (Protein Disulfide Isomerase) can regulate the formation of thrombi in the blood.
Until now, it was known that blockade of this protein slows platelet aggregation and fibrin formation, two facts that contribute to the formation of the clot.
Through this research, it is demonstrated that nitric oxide is able to regulate the proaggregant and procoagulant activity of this PDI protein, through the nitrosilation of its cysteine ​​residues (S-nitrosylation).
This discovery thus establishes a new target and a new mechanism for antithrombotic therapy.
David Iyú Espinosa, dean-curator of the Faculty of Sociosanitarias Sciences of Lorca, is the participant on the part of the Murcian institution in this study.
Iyú believes that "this new mechanism opens the possibility of knowing in more detail this process and that is fundamental to better understand how the disease appears and develops."
In addition, "it has made it possible to find a therapeutic target for the development of new drugs that add to existing ones, and thus help those patients who continue to have thrombotic episodes despite following a treatment," concludes the researcher.
As the second author, he has carried out the necessary experiments to generate nitric oxide inside the cells, a task without which it would not have been possible to evaluate the influence of said compound on the function of the PDI protein, nor the chemical modifications that determine its biological activity .
This study has been coordinated by the Thrombosis and Haemostasis Division of the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center of Harvard University (USA), and has the dean of the Murcia institution as second author.
Scientists from the University of Marseille (France), the University of New South Wales and the University of Sydney, both in Australia, have also participated.
Source: Universidad de Murcia
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