Drug Target Identification & Validation Services for Cardiovascular Diseases

The discovery of innovative drugs for treating cardiovascular diseases has consistently been a popular topic among medical and pharmacological researchers worldwide. Identifying new targets related to cardiovascular diseases is one of the key approaches to developing innovative drugs. Ace Therapeutics has a comprehensive target identification and validation platform to help clients accelerate novel drug discovery for cardiovascular diseases.

Overview of Drug Targets for Cardiovascular Diseases

Target-based drug design is the most important method for the development of new drugs in the modern era. Traditional therapeutic targets of cardiovascular disease drugs mainly contain receptors, ion channels, cytokines and enzymes. In addition to traditional drug targets, nucleic acid-targeted cardiovascular drugs have attracted increasing attention in recent years with the rapid development of molecular biology technology. The common drug targets related to cardiovascular diseases are shown in the table below.

Table 1. Common Drug Targets for Cardiovascular Diseases

With the high-end technology platform, Ace Therapeutics provides customers with target identification and validation services to help clients develop novel cardiovascular drugs.

Target Identification by Molecular Type

• Cardiac Enzymes
• Receptors
• Lipoproteins
• Ion Channels
• LncRNAs

Target Identification by Pathophysiology of Cardiovascular Diseases

• Inflammatory Pathways
• Oxidative Stress Pathways
• Autophagy Pathways
• Apoptosis Pathways
• Cardiac Metabolism

Target Identification for Cardiovascular Diseases

We can utilize bioinformatics tools and databases to collect genomic, proteomic, and metabolomic data to identify potential targets related to pathological processes such as cardiovascular inflammation, oxidative stress, lipid metabolism, and vascular remodeling.

• Genomics-based Target Identification
  We can conduct analysis of gene expression profiling to identify cardiovascular diseases-related genes and genetic mutations for searching potential drug targets of cardiovascular diseases.
• Transcriptomics-based Target Identification
  We can perform RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq) and transcript-level expression analysis to identify differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between cardiovascular disease and health states.
• Proteomics-based Target Identification
  We can identify and quantify proteins in cardiovascular tissues and blood samples by mapping protein–protein interactions to identify key node and pathway proteins associated with cardiovascular disease.
• Metabolomics-based Target Identification
  We can analyze metabolites in blood and tissues using techniques such as mass spectrometry (MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) to identify disrupted metabolic pathways in cardiovascular disease as a way to find potential targets.
• Cardioinformatics-based Target Identification
  We can use bioinformatics methods to construct and analyze biological networks (genes, proteins, metabolism) to identify central nodes and pathways that may be targets for cardiovascular disease therapeutics so as to predict potential targets.

Target Validation for Cardiovascular Diseases

After obtaining potential targets, we can validate the function of the targets in cellular and animal models, as well as clarify the relevance of the targets to the pathogenesis of cardiovascular disease.

• Knock-down of Target Genes
  We can use siRNA vectors, shRNA vectors, or CRISPRi vectors to knock down the expression level of target genes in cells or animals to study the regulation of target genes in cardiovascular diseases.
• Knock-out and Knock-in of Target Genes
  We can use CRISPR/Cas9 vectors, transcription activator-like effector nucleases (TALENs) vectors, or zinc finger nucleases (ZFNs) vectors to knock out (or knock-in) target gene fragments in cells or animals to validate the effect of the potential targets on cardiovascular diseases.

Ace Therapeutics is a contract research organization dedicated to providing outsourcing services for cardiovascular disease research. With professional equipment platforms and dedicated research teams, we can provide drug target identification & validation services according to clients' needs. If you are interested in our services, please do not hesitate to contact us.