Unborn babies at risk of low oxygen levels because of pregnancy complications could benefit from a specialist antioxidant to help prevent future heart disease, researchers reported last night.
A University of Cambridge, UK, study using sheep found that the specialised antioxidant MitoQ can prevent heart disease at its onset.
The discovery, published in the latest edition of Science Advances, builds on strong evidence that the environment experienced during sensitive periods of foetal development directly influences long-term cardiovascular health.
Lead study author Professor Dino Giussani from the University of Cambridge’s Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience, said: “If we want to reduce the prevalence of cardiovascular disease, we need to think of prevention rather than a cure.
“Applying this concept to pregnancy complications, we can bring preventative medicine all the way back into the womb – it’s treatment before birth. It completely changes our way of thinking about heart disease.”
Chronic hypoxia is a common complication in pregnancy and it can be caused by conditions including pre-eclampsia, infection of the placenta, gestational diabetes or maternal obesity. Oxidative stress largely originates in the cells’ mitochondria.
The Cambridge team targeted the mitochondria with MitoQ, which was developed by Professor Mike Murphy and his colleagues at the University of Cambridge’s MRC-Mitochondrial Biology Unit, and found that it selectively accumulates within mitochondria, where it works to reduce oxidative stress.
When it was given to pregnant sheep under low oxygen conditions, the mitochondrial therapy protected against foetal growth restriction and high blood pressure in the offspring as adults.
They also showed that MitoQ protects against mitochondria-derived oxidative stress in chicken embryos.
Prof Murphy said MitoQ has already been used in human trials, including one where it helped to lower hypertension in older subjects.
“It is very exciting to see the potential to use MitoQ to treat a baby during a problematic pregnancy and prevent problems arising far later in life,” he said. “There’s still a long way to go before this can be used by pregnant mothers, but our work points to new possibilities for novel treatments.”
Professor James Leiper, associate medical director at the British Heart Foundation, added: “This study reveals a plausible way to reduce the future risk of high blood pressure and consequent heart disease in babies from complicated pregnancies.
“Further research is now needed to translate these findings from animals to humans and identify the most effective time in development to give the MitoQ supplement to ‘at risk’ babies – whether that’s a particular point during pregnancy or soon after birth. Overcoming this next hurdle will enable it to be tested in clinical trials.”
Botting KJ, Skeffington KL, Niu y et al. Translatable mitochondria-targeted protection against programmed cardiovascular dysfunction. Science Advances 19 August 2020.
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