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Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute Scientists in Western Australia Awarded $500,000 to accelerate new treatment into ‘big heart
Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute
The funding boost by global biotech giant CSL will be used to drive research into hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, the world’s leading cause of cardiac death for children aged between five and 15.
It is hoped the award will help Professor Livia Hool and her WA based team deliver through on their breakthrough discovery, which could potentially both prevent and reverse the damage of the inherited heart disease which causes the heart to become dangerously large.
“This disease affects around one in 500 people and could be as common as one in every 200. It’s shocking that we have no way of preventing or reversing the damage to the heart. All we can do now is alleviate the symptoms,” says Professor Livia Hool.
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According to the Barker hypothesis (Hales and Barker 1992) (also referred to as small baby syndrome ), infants with too low body weight have an increased risk of suffering from cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure, diabetes and chronic kidney diseases in adulthood. According to this hypothesis, fetal protective mechanisms enable adaptation to unfavorable intrauterine conditions (chronic oxygen or nutrient deficiency) and allow for fetal survival. At the same time, however, they lead to permanent structural and functional strains and changes into adulthood. The comprehensive study recently published in
Nature Communications now clarifies central mechanisms of this phenomenon.
Fetuin-A plays a key role