( ople at risk of chronic rejection befor...)Proteins may predict lung transplant rejection

ople at risk of chronic rejection before they have the clinical manifestations," Wendt said. In addition to early identification, the researchers hope to eventually open the door to developing a preventative treatment and also gain insight into the physiological mechanisms of lung rejection.

Lung fluid samples from '93-'96

The study used 411 lavage samples obtained from 137 lung transplant recipients from 1993-1996, Wendt explained. A lavage is a liquid that doctors introduce into the lung to wash out unwanted material. When the wash is removed, it contains biological material, including proteins, that the researchers hypothesized would be able to identify those who later suffered organ rejection.

Because this study looked back at patients treated years ago, the researchers could look for differences between patients who subsequently suffered chronic lung rejection and those who did not.

The researchers combined proteomics (the study of proteins), the latest in mass spectrometry technology and the best analytical methods from the field of bioinformatics (the use of computers and statistics to analyze and find patterns in scads of data). They hypothesized that proteins would change as chronic lung rejection developed and that the new technology would make it possible to find these patterns from among the thousands of proteins at work in the lungs.

Some promising results

An earlier study from the laboratory had found that elevated levels of human neutrophil peptide (HNP), declining Clara cell secretory protein and some previously unidentified proteins were highly correlated with chronic lung rejection. In particular, the researchers found that HNP was three times more likely to be elevated among those who later suffered chronic rejection.

Later analyses identified 265 proteins that were upregulated in lung rejection up to 20 months before it happened. With yet more research, they found
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Source:American Physiological Society

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