Authors: Acosta, Juan; Qin, Xuebin; Halperin, Jose

Source: Current Pharmaceutical Design, Volume 10, Number 2, January 2004 , pp. 203-211(9)

Publisher: Bentham Science Publishers

Abstract:

By-products of complement activation and complement regulatory proteins are increasingly recognized to play an important pathogenic role in a variety of vascular diseases including atherosclerosis, ischemia and reperfusion injury, hyperacute graft rejection, vasculitis, and the vascular complications of human diabetes. “Self” damage by autologous complement is mediated by activation products of the complement cascades or by direct insertion of the membrane attack complex (MAC) into cell membranes. Specifically, insertion of MAC complexes into endothelial cells results in the release of an array of growth factors and cytokines that induces proliferation, inflammation and thrombosis in the vascular wall. This paper reviews complement and complement regulatory proteins with specific focus on the vasculature and vascular diseases; it highlights complement and its regulators as potential targets for the rational design of mechanismspecific drugs for the treatment of some of the most prevalent human diseases.

Keywords: Proteins; mechanismspecific; vasculitis; thrombosis; MAC complexes

Document Type: Review article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.2174/1381612043453441

Affiliations: 1: Harvard Medical School, 1 Kendall Square, Bldg. 600, 3rd Floor, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.

Publication date: 2004-01-01

More about this publication?

• Current Pharmaceutical Design publishes timely in-depth reviews covering all aspects of current research in rational drug design. Each issue is devoted to a single major therapeutic area. A Guest Editor who is an acknowledged authority in a therapeutic field has solicits for each issue comprehensive and timely reviews from leading researchers in the pharmaceutical industry and academia.
  
  Each thematic issue of Current Pharmaceutical Design covers all subject areas of major importance to modern drug design, including: medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, drug targets and disease mechanism.

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