Publications

Background and aims: Liver fibrosis results from a prolonged wound healing response to continued injury with excessive production of extracellular proteins. In patients with chronic liver disease, the monitoring of liver fibrosis dynamics is of high interest. Whilst markers of fibrogenesis exist, ...

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• Biomarker Insights
• Hepatic Diseases
• Fibrosis

Background and aims Endoscopy and the use of fecal calprotectin (fecal CP) are among the least favored methods for assessing disease activity by inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients; the handling/processing of fecal samples is also impractical. Therefore, we sought to develop a novel neo-epi...

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• Gastrointestinal
• Crohn's disease
• Ulcerative colitis
• Neutrophil activity
• Inflammatory Bowel Disease

Increased turnover of extracellular matrix proteins is seen in many different diseases and is an underlying and driving feature of pathogenesis. An increased ratio of formation over degradation of extracellular matrix proteins, such as collagens, leads to accumulation of proteins in the tissues, ult...

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• Biomarker Insights
• Biomarkers
• Cancer
• Heart Failure

Objectives: There is a need for precision medicine and an unspoken promise of an optimal approach for identification of the right patients for value-based medicine based on big data. However, there may be a misconception that measurement of proteins is more valuable than measurement of fewer selecte...

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• Biomarker Insights
• Extracellular Matrix Research

Introduction: Enzymatic cross-linking of the collagens within the extracellular matrix (ECM) catalyzed by enzymes such as lysyl oxidase (LOX) and lysyl oxidase like-enzymes 1-4 (LOXL), transglutaminase 2 (TG2), and peroxidasin (PXDN) contribute to fibrosis progression through extensive collagen cros...

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• Fibrosis
• Extracellular Matrix Research

Abstract In inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), the chronic inflammation deeply affects the intestinal extracellular matrix. The aim of this study was to investigate if remodeling of the intestinal basement membrane type VI collagen was associated with pathophysiological changes in Crohn's disease ...

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• Inflammatory Bowel Disease

Type XI collagen has been associated with tumor fibrosis and aggressiveness in patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC). The propeptide on Type XI collagen is released into the circulation after proteolytic processing at either amino acid 253 or 511. This allows for a noninvasive biomar...

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• Biomarker Insights
• Pancreas
• Biomarkers

Introduction: Interstitial, cartilage, and bone collagens have been proposed as biomarkers of joint deterioration in hemophilic arthropathy. The role of basement membrane (type IV and VIII) collagens as biomarkers of endothelial turnover in relation to acute joint bleeding is not understood. Method...

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• Biomarkers
• Hemophilia
• Hemarthrosis

Introduction: Variants in collagen-related genes COL1A1, COL3A1, COL5A1 and COL5A2 are associated with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS), a heterogeneous group of connective tissue disorders strongly associated with increased bleeding. Of patients with incompletely explained bleeding diathesis, a relativ...

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• Ehlos-Danlos
• Collagen

Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is characterized by abnormal epithelial repair resulting in a hypercoagulable state with intra-alveolar accumulation of fibrin and alveolar basement membrane destruction. This study aimed to investigate if the combination of two serological bi...

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• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Introduction: Anti-tumor necrosis factor (TNF) therapy is effective in inducing remission in Crohn's disease in 60% of patients. No serological biomarkers are available, which can predict response to anti-TNF. We aimed to investigate serological markers of collagen turnover reflecting tissue inflamm...

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• Biomarkers

Background & aims: Primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC), primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) and autoimmune hepatitis (AIH) are phenotypically distinct autoimmune liver diseases that progress to cirrhosis and liver failure; however, their histological fibrosis distribution differs. We investigated...

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• Hepatic Diseases

Background: Lung epithelial damage, activation of the wound healing cascade, and remodeling of the extracellular matrix (ECM) play a major role in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The pro-peptide of type VI collagen has been identified as the hormone endotrophin. Endotrophin has been sh...

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Background: In Crohn's disease (CD), 10% to 40% of patients do not respond to anti-tumor necrosis factor-α (TNFα) treatment. Currently, there are no biomarkers with adequate sensitivity to separate responders from nonresponders at an early stage. Aim: The aim of this study was to investigated wheth...

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• Gastrointestinal

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is characterized by a slow heterogeneous progression. Therefore, improved biomarkers that can accurately identify patients with the highest likelihood of progression and therefore the ability to benefit from a given treatment, are needed. Elastin is an es...

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• Respiratory diseases
• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is characterized by chronic inflammation and lung tissue deterioration. Given the high vascularity of the lung, von Willebrand factor (VWF), a central component of wound healing initiation, has previously been assessed in COPD. VWF processing,...

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• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
• Respiratory diseases

Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is characterized by abnormal epithelial repair process that may result in intra-airway accumulation of fibrin. Given that plasma fibrinogen is the only FDA approved biomarker that predicts mortality and COPD exacerbations, we hypothesized that...

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• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
• Respiratory diseases

Vascular remodeling associated with hemophilic arthropathy (HA) may contribute to bleed propagation, but the mechanisms remain poorly understood. OBJECTIVES: To explore molecular mechanisms of HA and the effects of hemostasis correction on synovial vascular remodeling after joint injury in hypocoag...

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• Hematology
• Hemophilia

Introduction: Extracellular matrix (ECM) remodeling of the intestinal tissue is important in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) due to the extensive mucosal remodeling. There are still gaps in our knowledge as to how ECM remodeling is related to intestinal epithelium homeostasis and healing of the int...

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• Gastrointestinal
• Inflammatory Bowel Disease

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Crohns disease (CD) is a chronic inflammatory condition characterized by continuous mucosal damage and ongoing wound healing of the intestines. The fibrinolytic system is involved in early parts of the wound healing process. Fibrin is a key mediator of primary blood clot formati...

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C-telopeptide of type II collagen (CTX-II) has been shown to be a highly relevant biomarker of cartilage degradation in human rheumatic diseases, if measured in synovial fluid or urine. However, serum or plasma CTX-II have not been demonstrated to have any clinical utility to date. Here, we describe...

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• Rheumatology
• Bone

OBJECTIVES: Portal hypertension in cirrhosis is associated with endothelial dysfunction, impaired wound healing, and decreased platelet count. Increased von Willebrand factor (VWF) formation has been suggested as a compensatory mechanism, but the role of VWF processing has not been directly assessed...

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• Gastrointestinal
• Hepatic Diseases

Background: Crohn’s disease (CD) is a chronic inflammatory condition of the intestinal tract resulting in severe intestinal tissue damage. The concept of mucosal healing has therefore gained significant interest as a therapeutic end point in the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Given t...

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• Gastrointestinal
• Inflammatory Bowel Disease
• Crohn's disease
• Ulcerative colitis

OBJECTIVE: Phenotypic changes of chondrocytes toward hypertrophy might be fundamental in the pathogenesis of OA, of which type X collagen (Col10) is a well-known marker. The purpose was to develop a specific immunoassay for blood quantification of a newly identified neo-epitope of type X collagen to...

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• Rheumatoid Arthritis
• Rheumatology
• Osteoarthritis

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is characterized by high levels of protease activity leading to degradation of elastin followed by loss of elasticity of the lung and the development of emphysema. Elastin is an essential structural component of the lung parenchyma to support the expansio...

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• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
• Respiratory diseases

The matricellular protein SPARC (secreted proteome acidic and rich in cysteine) is known to bind collagens and regulate fibrillogenesis. Cleavage of SPARC at a single peptide bond, increases the affinity for collagens up to 20-fold. To investigate if this specific cleavage has pathological relevance...

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• Oncology
• Respiratory diseases
• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
• Fibrosis
• Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis

OBJECTIVES: Fibrosis and cancer are characterized by extracellular matrix (ECM) remodeling. The basement membrane is mainly composed by collagen type IV and laminin. Tumstatin is a matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9) generated matrikine of collagen type IV α3 chain. We evaluated the potential of tums...

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• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
• Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis
• Oncology
• Respiratory diseases
• Fibrosis

INTRODUCTION: The medical need in the haemophilic (HF) field to reduce bleeding incidents requires measurement of the annual bleeding rate (ABR) in haemophiliacs. Vascular rupture is associated with damage to the vascular endothelium causing exposure of the basement membrane. Endothelial cells and m...

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• Hematology
• Hemophilia

BACKGROUND:Increased protease activity is a key pathological feature of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). However, the differences in extracellular matrix remodelling (ECM) in Crohn\u0027s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) are not well described. An increased understanding of the inflammatory...

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• Gastrointestinal
• Inflammatory Bowel Disease

Altered extracellular matrix (ECM) turnover is a central pathological feature of many diseases. The ECM is a meshwork of molecules that provides structural support to cells throughout the body. It consists mainly of two membranes: the interstitial matrix, which is present between parenchymal cells i...

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• Hematology
• Hemophilia