Peptide directoryHeart, vessels & kidneys

Vasostatin-2

A longer vasostatin, from the start of chromogranin A to residue 113.

Where it comes from

Made in
Chromaffin cells and the heart
Sent out by
With catecholamines
Acts on
  • Arteries
  • Heart
  • Vessels (angiogenesis)

What it does

  • Relaxes vessels as vasostatin-1 does, since it contains the whole of it 3
  • Promotes new vessel growth in ischaemic muscle and heart in diabetic mice, through ACE2 1
  • Lower blood levels go with poorer collateral vessels in diabetic patients whose coronary artery is completely blocked 1

In medicine

  • No medicine and no test. Serum vasostatin-2 has been measured in one large patient series and nowhere in routine practice 1
  • It cannot be separated from vasostatin-1 by sequence, since vasostatin-1 is its first 76 residues. Any antibody raised to that stretch sees both, which is why the two have separate literatures but not separate assays 3

Beyond the body’s own use

  • In 452 diabetic patients with a completely blocked coronary artery, serum vasostatin-2 rose step by step with the grade of collateral vessels, and giving the recombinant protein promoted vessel growth in diabetic mice 1
  • In mice lacking ApoE it reduced atherosclerosis and the recruitment of monocytes and macrophages, which is the anti-inflammatory side of the same story 2
  • All of the treatment work is in rodents and no human trial has been registered. In people there are only associations, and they come from one group 1

Sources

  1. Bao et al., Vasostatin-2 and coronary collateral vessel formation in diabetic patients, European Heart Journal 2023
  2. Xiong et al., The anti-inflammatory vasostatin-2 attenuates atherosclerosis in ApoE-null mice, Thrombosis and Haemostasis 2017
  3. Troger et al., Granin-derived peptides, Progress in Neurobiology 2017

This card describes what a medicine is for and what the evidence says; it recommends nothing. Talk to your clinician about anything you read here.