Doctors cannot currently predict preeclampsia, a serious pregnancy-related high blood pressure disorder. Preeclampsia can lead to preterm birth and life-threatening complications for pregnant people and their infants. A team of scientists funded by NICHD through the Human Placenta Project (HPP) is working to develop a screening test to predict and diagnose preeclampsia by using flow cytometry, a common method for sorting and separating different cells within a sample.
Establishing Biomarkers
Extracellular vesicles (EVs), tiny particles released from cells, are believed to be involved in communication between different cell types. Cells from the fetus and the placenta release different types and numbers of EVs. The working hypothesis of a team led by Terry Morgan, M.D., Ph.D., is that the number and type of EVs will differ between healthy pregnancies and preeclamptic pregnancies. The team is using flow cytometry to explore these differences. In an earlier study, the team used the technique to count the number and type of EVs in plasma samples taken from pregnant people.
Promise of Early Detection
Years of unsuccessful searching for biomarkers of preeclampsia have led to the primary conclusion that preeclampsia is more than one disease and can be understood as a syndrome with different pathways to the same blood pressure–related symptoms and atypical birth outcomes. Hidden signs of preeclampsia are thought to be present by the end of the third trimester. The team is using HPP funding to work toward detecting placental changes earlier, before late-onset symptoms, such as high blood pressure, appear.
Learn more about the team
Principal Investigator(s):
Learn more about the HPP-funded project:
High Resolution Flow Cytometry Profiling of Extracellular Vesicles in Preeclampsia
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