Like Venom Coursing Through the Body: Researchers Identify Mechanism Driving COVID-19 Mortality

In this study, we were able to identify patterns of metabolites that were present in individuals who succumbed to the disease, " said lead study authorJustin Snider, an assistant research professor in the UArizonaDepartment of Nutrition. " The metabolites that surfaced revealed cell energy dysfunction and high levels of the sPLA2-IIA enzyme. The former was expected but not the latter. "Using the same machine learning methods, the researchers developed a decision tree to predict COVID-19 mortality. Most healthy individuals have circulating levels of the sPLA2-IIA enzyme hovering around half a nanogram per milliliter. According to the study, COVID-19 was lethal in 63% of patients who had severe COVID-19 and levels of sPLA2-IIA equal to or greater than 10 nanograms per milliliter." Many patients who died from COVID-19 had some of the highest levels of this enzyme that have ever been reported, " said Chilton, who has been studying the enzyme for over three decades.An Enzyme with a BiteThe role of the sPLA2-IIA enzyme has been the subject of study for half of a century and it is " possibly the most examined member of the phospholipase family, " Chilton explained.  Charles McCall, lead researcher from the Wake Forest School of Medicine on the study, refers to the enzyme as a " shredder " for its known prevalence in severe inflammation events, such as bacterial sepsis, as well as hemorrhagic and cardiac shock.Previous research has shown how the enzyme destroys microbial cell membra...
Source: The University of Arizona: Health - Category: Universities & Medical Training Authors: Source Type: research