Heart beats fat
Researchers from The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center have discovered that knocking down microRNA-208a in the heart leads to systemic benefits in obesity and metabolic disease, in addition to the already known effects on preventing cardiac hypertrophy and fibrosis.1 The findings could expand the potential indications for miRagen Therapeutics Inc.'s lead candidate, antimiR-208, which is partnered with Servier and is in preclinical development for cardiac hypertrophy.
Team leader Eric Olson, chairman of molecular biology at UT Southwestern and a cofounder and chief scientific advisor to miRagen, said his group initially set out to study miR-208a's function in the heart but ended up uncovering a mechanism by which the heart regulates systemic metabolism...