Amorphous calcium phosphate drives aortic valve stiffening

University of Illinois at Urbana-ChampaignJun 27 2024 The human body has sophisticated defenses against the deposition of calcium minerals that stiffen heart tissues, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and collaborators at UCLA Health and the University of Texas at Austin found in a new study that provides the first detailed, step-by-step documentation of how calcification progresses.

With calcification in blood vessels, a stent can help, but you can't do that with the aortic valve. Every organ in the body can be in perfect condition, but if the aortic valve stops functioning, that's the end of that life." Despite the prevalence and biological importance, little is known about how the calcium deposits form or grow.

Crucially, the team found that the form of calcium phosphate in the mineral deposits is not the same type as found in bone, called apatite, as has been widely thought. Instead, the deposits consist predominately of amorphous calcium phosphate, which has the ability to morphologically shapeshift and atomically rearrange.

"However, the silver lining to all of this is that we also found that our body has evolved these incredibly intricate and effective processes to fight mineralization. It can't stop it, but it can slow it down dramatically."

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