Cereblon protein breaks down the calcium channel that regulates heart contractility and causes heart failure
The discovery of a protein that causes heart failure
Provided by Harvard University School of Medicine, USA
During the changing season, when the temperature difference between day and night is large, we often hear news of the sudden death of middle-aged men who looked normally healthy. The cause of sudden death is often a heart disease such as heart failure. A Korean research team has discovered a substance in the body that causes heart failure, the cause of sudden death.
The research team at the Center for Cardiovascular and Metabolic Diseases at Inje University College of Medicine announced on the 21st that they have identified a new function of a protein called ‘Cereblon’ that regulates the electrical activity and contractile force of the heart. The results of this study were published in the ‘European Heart Journal’, an international medical journal.
Heart failure is a disease caused by an inability to supply blood to the body due to decreased heart function, and ranks second in mortality following cancer in Korea. In particular, it is a high-risk disease that increases in prevalence every year and shortens healthy lifespan. The problem is that the exact pathogenesis is not known, so there is no way to treat heart failure itself. Most of the treatment is hyperlipidemia and high blood pressure drugs and surgery only to improve symptoms.
The research team paid attention to the increased expression of the cereblon gene, which determines the breakdown of specific proteins and regulates various cellular functions, in the heart of patients with heart failure. The research team was the first to discover that the cereblon protein degrades the calcium pathway that regulates cardiac contractility through a mouse experiment. It was also confirmed that mice with low expression of cereblon protein had cardiac contractility and resistance to heart disease.
Professor Kim Hyung-gyu, Inje University Medical School, said, “The main cause of death in patients with heart disease is ‘heart failure with reduced left ventricular ejection fraction’ (HFrEF), which is a decrease in the heart’s left ventricle contractility. – Improvement of the calcium channel signaling system will help develop new therapeutic agents to prevent heart failure.”
Reporter Yoo Yong-ha