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Medicine

Genetic spotlight on a blood defect

Nature volume 427, pages 592–593 (2004)Cite this article

The causes of defects in the blood system of newborn babies can be hard to establish if the errors are not inherited. An elegant approach has identified a gene that can encourage new blood vessels to grow.

Babies who are born with defects in their vascular system face serious medical and social problems. But we know little about the cause of these blood-vessel anomalies1,2. Discovering the genetic basis of such vascular birth defects remains a challenge, as most of these errors are not inherited. Instead, they occur sporadically and affect only certain areas of the body.

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Figure 1: Alterations in the VG5Q gene that lead to vascular defects in Klippel–Trenaunay syndrome.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Transgene Technology and Gene Therapy, Flanders Interuniversity Institute for Biotechnology, University of Leuven, Leuven, B-3000, Belgium

    Diether Lambrechts & Peter Carmeliet

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  1. Diether Lambrechts
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  2. Peter Carmeliet
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Lambrechts, D., Carmeliet, P. Genetic spotlight on a blood defect. Nature 427, 592–593 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/427592a

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