New study sheds light on how blood clots are formed

New research led by RCSI University of Medicine and Health has revealed how blood clots are formed during wound healing.

The research was published in the journal, 'Science Advances'.

The research examined the behavior of platelets at a wound site, specifically their ability to sense where within a blood clot they are and remodel their surroundings accordingly.

Platelets are key to initiating wound healing and the formation of blood clots (thrombus). Fibroblasts are connective tissue cells that are essential for the later stages of wound healing. Fibroblasts invade the clot that has been formed and produces vital proteins, including fibronectin, that then form a structural framework to build the new tissue needed to heal.

This new study indicated that platelets could also form a provisional fibronectin matrix in their surroundings, similar to what fibroblasts did in the later stages of wound healing. This has potential implications for how the integrity of blood clots might be maintained during the vascular repair.

The study's lead author was Doctor Ingmar Schoen from the School of Pharmacy and Bimolecular Sciences at RCSI.

Commenting on the discovery, Doctor Schoen said, "We have identified an additional unexpected role for the most prominent platelet adhesion receptor. Our results show that platelets not only form the clot but also can initiate its remodeling by erecting a fibrous scaffold. This finding challenges some existing paradigms in the field of wound healing, which is dominated by research on fibroblasts."

Key to this research was the use of super-resolution microscopy, which enables sharper images of structures inside or around cells to be captured and observed in vitro, in a laboratory. Observation of this platelet behavior in a living organism (in vivo) will be required to further develop this finding.

"Without super-resolution microscopy, this discovery would not have been possible," Doctor Schoen noted.