A dietary supplement developed at the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute has been found to stop the progression of heart failure in animal models, providing further evidence of the supplement's efficacy for potential use in humans.
The new paper, published in Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology Plus, has shown that feeding mice a diet that included this supplement, elevated energy-boosting, anti-oxidant fats that circulate in our blood, called plasmalogen lipids, which restores the integrity of damaged cells in a failing heart.
Plasmalogens make up about 15 per cent of cell membranes — the outer layer of cells — and are predominantly found in the brain and heart. They are important for immune function, energy metabolism and for their antioxidant properties, co-senior author Dr Yow Keat Tham said.
"The cell membrane is the barrier between what happens outside and inside of the cell," Dr Tham said. "What we're doing is adding something to the diet that would increase the levels of these plasmalogens, which help to smooth out the surface of the cells that have been damaged by disease, and restore functionality," he said.
Disruptions to the cell membrane can change the composition of the lipids within cells and that can contribute to and exacerbate the seriousness of diseases including obesity, neurological and cardiovascular diseases, paper first author Teleah Belkin said.
"A heart with cardiomyopathy — or heart failure — has reduced levels of plasmalogens, so we were looking at whether including this plasmalogen-enriching dietary supplement was able to replenish the plasmalogens in a diseased heart," Ms Belkin said. "What we found was that the dietary supplement was able to restore cardiac function and lessen other pathological features associated with heart failure."
Earlier Baker Institute trials using variations of this dietary supplement have already shown the therapeutic potential of enhancing plasmalogen levels in preclinical models of atherosclerosis, fatty liver disease and even in obese human study participants, but this is the first study that shows this plasmalogen-modulating dietary supplement has therapeutic potential for the heart, lungs and kidneys in a preclinical model of dilated cardiomyopathy.
"We showed that when we elevated circulating and cardiac plasmalogens with this dietary supplement in mice with heart failure, remodelling of the lipid composition in the heart occurred, reducing the negative effects associated with cardiomyopathy, including tissue scarring and impaired mitochondrial properties, which are crucial for producing energy for the heart," Dr Tham said.
"Interestingly, this approach provided greater protection in males than females and highlights the importance of including both sexes in preclinical and clinical research."
Plasmalogens can be found naturally in foods, including mussels, scallops and octopus, and even strawberries, but you would have to consume large quantities of these food items to potentially receive the health benefits. The Baker Institute supplement, licenced to Juvenescence Ltd, contains natural components that support the production of plasmalogens in our body.
Human clinical trials to test the efficacy of the patented supplement on a range of health outcomes, including arterial function, lipid metabolism and inflammation, will start in late 2025, and there are hopes that the supplement will be available sometime within in the next two years.
"We'd also like to test the diet in other models of heart failure, or even different heart settings, including in people who have had a heart attack," Dr Tham said. "We'd test whether we're able to reverse some of that heart damage that occurred from the heart attack with this supplement."
