Recombinant Thrombin and Thrombin-like Peptides

A hemorrhage of a blood vessel, body tissue, organ or bone can result in blood loss leading to hypovolemic shock and death. In haemophiliacs and patients receiving anticoagulants medication, such as often prescribed post-operatively for heart surgery, the problem of rapid blood loss is even more acute. Many attempts have been made to devise a fast and effective method to arrest the loss of blood such as fibrin glue, collagen patch, firbin sealant, and TAF patch which have been shown to be ineffective in most of the cases and also shown to induce antigenecity. The proposed work will utilize recombinant thrombin or thrombin-like peptides to address such issues.

Recombinant thrombin or thrombin-like peptide is a human coagulation protein produced via recombinant DNA technology from a genetically engineered Chinese Hamster Ovary (CHO) cell line or Pichia pastoris. Recombinant thrombin is identical in amino acid sequence and structurally similar to naturally occurring human thrombin. The expressed protein is purified by a chromatographic process that yields a product having hemostatic activities similar to native human thrombin.