Date of Award

Summer 2024

Document Type

Open Access Thesis

Department

Biomedical Engineering

First Advisor

Jay Potts

Abstract

Heart failure affects millions of people worldwide with current available treatments that are limited in their efficacy. The financial burden for care of those with heart failure is over 20 billion dollars in the US alone. Calcitonin gene related peptide has demonstrated cardioprotective and powerful vasodilator effects. In this study our objective is to prevent the onset of heart failure and treat early stages of heart failure with injections of calcitonin gene related peptide in C57BL/6 mice. In order to model heart failure, experimental mice underwent a transverse aortic constriction surgery. Echocardiograms and fecal collections were completed to observe changes in the gut microbiome and ejection fraction. After sacrifice organs were collected for H&E histology analysis. Smaller villus to crypt ratios were observed in calcitonin gene related peptide treated groups as well as the transverse aortic constriction group when given enough time for heart failure to develop. Mixed results in the gut microbiome showed that calcitonin gene related peptide has an effect, but it is inconclusive if the peptide aids in healing or if it does the opposite. These results show the promising preliminary applications for calcitonin gene related peptide. Calcitonin gene related peptide causes histological changes in the villi of the small intestine, but the bacterial growth changes vary dramatically between experiments and need further testing. Our results conclusively demonstrate that calcitonin gene related peptide does aid in the treatment and prevention of heart failure in the transverse aortic constriction mice model.

Rights

© 2024, Talia Charlotte Kepniss

Download

Share

COinS