PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

First genetic mutation linked to heart failure in pregnant women

Intermountain Medical Center research team in Utah finds first genetic mutation linked to heart failure in pregnant women

2011-06-22
(Press-News.org) Researchers at the Intermountain Medical Center Heart Institute in Salt Lake City have identified the first genetic mutation ever associated with a mysterious and potentially devastating form of heart disease that affects women in the final weeks of pregnancy or the first few months after delivery.

The disease, peripartum cardiomyopathy (PPCM), weakens a woman's heart so that it no longer pumps blood efficiently. The disease is relatively rare, affecting about one in 3,000 to 4,000 previously healthy American women. Most PPCM patients are treated with medicine, but about 10 percent require a heart transplant or mechanical heart-assist device to survive. The cause of PPCM has been unknown.

"This is an important breakthrough," said Benjamin Horne, PhD, director of cardiovascular and genetic epidemiology at Intermountain Medical Center and lead researcher for the study, which has just been published in the online edition of Circulation: Cardiovascular Genetics and will soon appear in the print edition of the journal.

"Until now, no one has identified a genetic link to the disease. This gives us and other researchers a roadmap that tells us where to look in the human genome for more information about the disease," said Dr. Horne. "Someday this may lead to early testing during pregnancy that can identify women who are at risk for peripartum cardiomyopathy. We may be able to reduce or even prevent some of the complications of this disease."

The research team gathered DNA samples at Intermountain Medical Center from 41 women in their 20s and 30s who had suffered from PPCM. They also took samples from 49 women who were over age 75 and had never experienced cardiac problems. The samples were sent for testing to a lab in Iceland, which used a special credit-card size device covered with 550,000 tiny dots of protein that, when mixed with human DNA, can isolate genetic mutations.

"The initial testing was a fishing expedition," said Dr. Horne. "We didn't know what genes or mutations in the human genome lead to PPCM, so we were just going to test anything out there and see what popped up," he said.

To the group's surprise, the testing found that about two-thirds of the women with PPCM shared a genetic mutation on chromosome 12. So they performed a second round of testing in a different set of patients — again, one group of women with PPCM and a control group of older women who had never experienced heart problems. This time, a second control group of younger women was also evaluated. The results of the second round mirrored the first. So they did it again with a third healthy group of women.

In the end, all three sets of tests confirmed their first finding: Women with PPCM in the study were about two-and-a-half times more likely than healthy women to carry the genetic mutation. In the world of medicine and genetics, that's a significant finding, said Dr. Horne.

"It turns out that the mutation on chromosome 12 is located near a gene that is a good candidate for pregnancy-related cardiomyopathy," said Dr. Horne. "That gene has been shown to be involved in regulating blood pressure and muscle contraction in the uterus and the heart."

The research group from Intermountain Medical Center is already moving forward with new studies that aim to build on this discovery and help women who develop this devastating condition.

###

Other lead researchers on the project included cardiologists Abdallah Kfoury, MD, and Rami Alharethi MD, and nurse practitioner Kismet Rasmusson, all from Intermountain Medical Center. Almost 20 researchers were involved, primarily from Intermountain's Heart Institute but also from Intermountain's Maternal Fetal Medicine program, the University of Utah, and the VA Hospital.

This study was supported in part by grants from the R. Harold Burton Foundation and the Deseret Foundation.

END



ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

U of M researchers find smart decisions for changing environmental times

2011-06-22
You've just been told you're going on a trip. The only problem is, you don't know where you're going, how you'll be traveling, or what you'll do when you get there. Sound like a wild ride? It's the one our planet is on right now. As land use, human population, consumption and atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations change at an unprecedented pace with complex and unpredictable interactions, it's anybody's guess where we'll end up or what we can do to ensure the most favorable outcome. Recognizing that "guess" is not good enough when talking about the viability of ...

Picky pollinators: Native bees are selective about where they live and feed

2011-06-22
INDIANA DUNES NATIONAL LAKESHORE, Ind. —Native bees – often small, stingless, solitary and unnoticed in the flashier world of stinging honeybees – are quite discriminating about where they live, according to U.S. Geological Survey research. The study found that, overall, composition of a plant community is a weak predictor of the composition of a bee community, which may seem counterintuitive at first, said USGS scientist and study lead Ralph Grundel. This may be because specialized plant-bee interactions, in which a given bee species only pollinates one plant species ...

Not-so-sweet potato from Clemson University, USDA resists pests, disease

2011-06-22
BLACKVILLE, S.C. — Scientists from Clemson University and the USDA Agricultural Research Service have developed a new variety of not-so-sweet potato, called Liberty. Known as a boniato, or tropical sweet potato, Liberty has a dark red skin and light yellow, dry flesh with a bland flavor. Boniato potatoes originated in the tropical Americas and are grown in south Florida in the United States. They can be served fried, mashed or in soup. "We developed Liberty because other boniato varieties are susceptible to damage by nematodes (microscopic parasitic worms)," said John ...

Stem cell model offers clues to cause of inherited ALS

Stem cell model offers clues to cause of inherited ALS
2011-06-22
An international team of scientists led by researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have used induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) derived from patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) to reveal for the first time how reduced levels of a specific protein may play a central role in causing at least one inherited form of the disease. The work, published in the June 2011 online issue of the journal Human Molecular Genetics, could help scientists overcome a major hurdle in the study and treatment of ALS, an incurable neuromuscular ...

Potato psyllid research helps producers determine best management practices

2011-06-22
AMARILLO – One potato field west of Bushland hosts three separate studies, all aimed at helping growers nationwide, even internationally, understand the habits and controls of the potato psyllid. The potato psyllid is the insect that transmits a bacterium that causes the relatively new disease in potatoes known as zebra chip, according to Dr. Charlie Rush, Texas AgriLife Research plant pathologist. The team of AgriLife Research scientists and a Texas AgriLife Extension Service specialist is working on potato psyllid control and epidemiology of disease transmission under ...

NASA sees Hurricane Beatriz 'wink' on the Mexican coast

NASA sees Hurricane Beatriz wink on the Mexican coast
2011-06-22
Hurricane Beatriz is skirting the southwestern Mexican coast today, June 21 and bringing heavy rains and high surf to coastal areas, including Mexico's biggest port. NASA satellite imagery showed that Beatriz seemed to develop an eye that opened on microwave imagery and closed on visible imagery, appearing to give satellites a "wink." Last night (June 20, 2011) by 8 p.m. EDT, heavy rains were spreading over the southwestern Mexican coast. At that time, Beatriz was still a tropical storm. By 11 p.m. EDT Beatriz had strengthened into a hurricane. At 5 a.m. EDT today, June ...

Infrared NASA imagery reveals a weaker tropical cyclone in the South China Sea

Infrared NASA imagery reveals a weaker tropical cyclone in the South China Sea
2011-06-22
Tropical Depression 06W is still slowing, making its way through the South China Sea today and has weakened overnight. NASA infrared satellite imagery showed a much more disorganized storm with scattered convection, which accounts for its weakened status from tropical storm to tropical depression. On June 21 at 1500 UTC (11 a.m. EDT) the newly weakened Tropical Depression 06W was located about 480 nautical miles east-southeast of Hanoi, Vietnam near 18.8 North and 113.8 East. Depression 06W's maximum sustained winds had decreased to 25 knots (28 mph/46 kmh). It was moving ...

CastleCasino.com Launches Live Roulette in Spanish

2011-06-22
Leading online casino CastleCasino.com has today furthered their live dealer offering with a new Spanish speaking version of their renowned live roulette game, broadcasted by real croupiers totally in Spanish. The new Spanish version of the live roulette game is shown live during 19.30PM and 4.00AM GMT and will feature in addition to the current English speaking version of the game. As well as the croupiers interacting with players in the Spanish language, the new live roulette version game interface will also be designed in Spanish, making it the easier for Spanish ...

Where will grizzly bears roam?

Where will grizzly bears roam?
2011-06-22
The independent assessment, written by WCS Senior Conservation Scientist Dr. John Weaver, is a compilation and synthesis of the latest information on these species – and how climate change may affect them – from 30 biologists in the region and from nearly 300 scientific papers. In addition, Weaver spent four months hiking and riding horseback through these remote roadless areas to evaluate their importance for conservation. The Crown of the Continent is a trans-border ecosystem of dramatic landscapes, pristine water sources, and diverse wildlife that stretches more than ...

Fort Worth Restaurant Introduces New "Anthony" Weiner with Photo Contest

Fort Worth Restaurant Introduces New "Anthony" Weiner with Photo Contest
2011-06-22
Chef Don at The Eatery on Beach Street has a delicious new creation for the dog days of summer: The "Anthony" Weiner. It's a kosher, half-pound hotdog served wrapped in lettuce or on a toasted bun. Patrons can choose toppings from ketchup, mustard, relish, grilled onions, chili, and even a bbq sauce with a hint of chocolate if they find the plain Anthony hard to swallow. The Anthony comes with hand cut fries on the side. "We recommend the Anthony wiener stay wrapped at all times," quipped Chef Don Gifford. Good and wholesome, this Anthony ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

UMass Amherst Nursing Professor Emerita honored as ‘Living Legend’

New guidelines aim to improve cystic fibrosis screening

Picky eaters by day, buffet by night: Butterfly, moth diets sync to plant aromas

Pennington Biomedical’s Dr. Leanne Redman honored with the E. V. McCollum Award from the American Society for Nutrition

CCNY physicists uncover electronic interactions mediated via spin waves

Researchers’ 3D-printing formula may transform future of foam

Nurture more important than nature for robotic hand

Drug-delivering aptamers target leukemia stem cells for one-two knockout punch

New study finds that over 95% of sponsored influencer posts on Twitter were not disclosed

New sea grant report helps great lakes fish farmers navigate aquaculture regulations

Strain “trick” improves perovskite solar cells’ efficiency

How GPS helps older drivers stay on the roads

Estrogen and progesterone stimulate the body to make opioids

Dancing with the cells – how acoustically levitating a diamond led to a breakthrough in biotech automation

Machine learning helps construct an evolutionary timeline of bacteria

Cellular regulator of mRNA vaccine revealed... offering new therapeutic options

Animal behavioral diversity at risk in the face of declining biodiversity

Finding their way: GPS ignites independence in older adult drivers

Antibiotic resistance among key bacterial species plateaus over time

‘Some insects are declining but what’s happening to the other 99%?’

Powerful new software platform could reshape biomedical research by making data analysis more accessible

Revealing capillaries and cells in living organs with ultrasound

American College of Physicians awards $260,000 in grants to address equity challenges in obesity care

Researchers from MARE ULisboa discover that the European catfish, an invasive species in Portugal, has a prolonged breeding season, enhancing its invasive potential

Rakesh K. Jain, PhD, FAACR, honored with the 2025 AACR Award for Lifetime Achievement in Cancer Research

Solar cells made of moon dust could power future space exploration

Deporting immigrants may further shrink the health care workforce

Border region emergency medical services in migrant emergency care

Resident physician intentions regarding unionization

Healthy nutrition and physical lifestyle choices lower cancer mortality risk for survivors, new ACS study finds

[Press-News.org] First genetic mutation linked to heart failure in pregnant women
Intermountain Medical Center research team in Utah finds first genetic mutation linked to heart failure in pregnant women