They discover a new method of regeneration of blood vessels

A study from the Chinese University of Nankai and King's College London found a possible way to regenerate blood vessels.

Cardiovascular disease is very common and one of the leading causes of death. The number of patients in China is 290 million, according to a Chinese report on the subject.

For the treatment of cardiovascular diseases, artificial devices or materials, such as artificial blood vessels or stents and coronary valves, have been commonly used.

Current materials, however, present a high risk of restenosis, a repeated narrowing of blood vessels that can make irrigation difficult. This effect usually occurs when the obstruction of the vessels that have been compressed is cleared.

The development of new materials for implants that stimulate vascular regeneration has therefore become a focus of research. The experts participating in the collaborative study decided to study the role of a key protein for the growth of new blood vessels known as Dickkopf-3 (DKK3).

Scientists used DKK3 in experiments with mice to construct an artificial vessel. After interaction with CXCR7, a protein receptor on the surface of vascular stem cells, which activated a downstream signal sequence, indicating that DKK could help induce stem cell movement and vessel regeneration.

Stem cells can renew or multiply without losing the potential to become other types of cells. The researchers found that some vascular stem cells play an important role in the regeneration of vessels.

This discovery may contribute to the creation of degradable transplants that resemble natural blood vessels, according to the researchers.

The joint work was published this month in the international journal Circulation Research.

Another scientific team located, prior to this study, a peptide of vascular stem cells that could cause the movement of these cells and the growth of vascular cells of the endothelium, which covers the interior of the vessels blood.

The peptide has a lot of potential for application in regenerative vascular medicine, said the eminent scientist Zhao Qiang.