Researchers have discovered a new gene that will control the blood vessel formation, an advance that may not only help in the development of the anti-cancer therapies but has also proven useful in diabetic eye and heart diseases.
Blood vessels do form a network throughout the body which delivers the nutrients necessary to keep the tissues and also the organs alive and healthy.
Further the formation of this network is controlled by a process which is called angiogenesis, as per the researchers.
Angiogenesis inhibition is usually targeted in cancer treatment development which aims to starve tumors of the nutrients necessary for their survival, researchers said.
New gene discovery may help treat heart disease & cancer
However in case of heart, increasing angiogenesis can further help heart pump function.
For the first time, Duke-NUS Medical School’s scientists in Singapore has uncovered a role for the gene, Wars2, in this process of the angiogenesis and has also confirmed the importance of Wars2 for the angiogenesis in rats and zebrafish.
Mao Wang from Duke-NUS has said that, using these different genetic techniques, they inhibited Wars2 function in both zebrafish and rats, and the resulting animals showed the impairment of blood vessel formation within the heart and also in the rest of the body.
To confirm the involvement of the Wars2 in angiogenesis, researchers have increased the effect of the Wars2 and showed that further the blood vessel formation was enhanced.
Wars2 can be the possible new drug target for heart disease and cancer, researchers said.
These findings were published in the journal Nature Communications.
