12.2.11


Approximately 5 per cent of patients with elevated blood pressure have benign endocrine tumours in their adrenal gland. The tumours produce abnormally high levels of the hormone aldosterone (the condition is known as primary aldosteronism), which in turn causes blood pressure to rise. Why the tumours arise has thus far been unknown.

Researchers at the Endocrine Surgery Unit at the Department of Surgical Sciences at Uppsala University Hospital, in collaboration with colleagues at the Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA, have now identified a causal mechanism.

The genetic codes of the relevant genes in tumour and normal tissue were analyzed by means of exome sequencing, a new technique. The results showed that mutation in a specific potassium channel (KCNJ5) – which has a role in the passage of molecules into and out of cells – results, in a large number of cases, in tumour growth and overproduction of the hormone aldosterone. This leads to increased levels of potassium and water in the blood, which raise the blood pressure. The same mutation turns out to underlie a rare genetic disease characterised by a difficult-to-treat high blood pressure condition.

"The discovery may help to improve diagnostics in connection with primary aldosteronism and cases of severe blood pressure elevation," says Peyman Björklund, a researcher at the Department of Surgical Sciences at Uppsala University. "The mutated potassium channel also represents a potential target molecule for treatment of the tumours in question."

0 comments:

Post a Comment

please leave your opinion about his blog ,
this will help us to give some more quality information.

Write 4 namesake-expert

Thank you for your interest in being part of the namesake-expert writing community.
namesake-expert publishes original news content, opinion pieces, trending topics and breaking stories in the area of technology, entertainment, business, politics, lifestyle, videos,sports, lifestyle and women’s issues. Articles must be written in English, published first on namesake-expert and will be reviewed by the “seasoned” namesake-expert Team.
If you are interested revert back to proud2_besingle@yahoo.co.in

side l

Texts

images in posts are not related to the content .
it pasted to relate the content or to describe the message of post.
if any photo of any person in post hurting any sentiment it can be removed busted. pls complain it to this Email -->
proud2_besingle@yahoo.co.in

Followers