PEORIA, Ill. – Researchers based in Peoria will soon begin studying a way to reduce the harmful effects of stroke in people.
The University of Illinois College of Medicine has been awarded a $300,000 grant for research into countering MMP-12, the molecule released in the body following a stroke. The grant comes from the American Heart Association.
Associate Professor Krishna Kumar Veeravalli says his team discovered MMP-12 in 2015. He says prior research shows that reducing the molecule in the body decreased brain damage and improved functional recovery.
Veeravalli says with this new grant funding, they can research ways to create an antibody to MMP-12.
“We need to come up with either small molecule inhibitors or antibodies against that molecule,” Veeravalli said. “So this AHA-grant funding supports the first step in that process of taking our discoveries from bench to clinic.”
The project’s research will also focus on timing and duration of treatment, and whether that can reduce brain damage or speed up recovery.
Currently, stroke victims are treated with a tissue-type plasminogen activator. But patients must reach a hospital 4-and-a-half hours after signs of a stroke develop. But the treatment does not cure brain damage that occurs with a stroke.
