REVIEW article

Front. Pharmacol.

Sec. Cardiovascular and Smooth Muscle Pharmacology

Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fphar.2025.1596767

This article is part of the Research TopicExploring Molecular Mechanisms and Novel Diagnostics in Cardiovascular Disease TreatmentView all 12 articles

Mechanism of action and potential therapeutic targets of TGF-β-related signaling pathway and its downstream miRNA expression in pulmonary arterial hypertension

Provisionally accepted
Yimo  HuangYimo Huang1Wende  MaWende Ma1Cen  GuoCen Guo1Xiaoling  SuXiaoling Su2*
  • 1Qinghai University, Xining, China
  • 2Qinghai Provincial People's Hospital, Xining, Qinghai Province, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Pulmonary hypertension is a major cardiovascular disease characterized by the persistent elevation of pulmonary artery pressure, leading to vascular remodeling, fibrosis, and endothelial dysfunction. In recent years, the TGF-β signaling pathway and miRNAs have played important roles in the pathogenesis of PH. TGF-β regulates the proliferation, migration and fibrosis of vascular smooth muscle cells through the classical Smad pathway and non-classical pathways such as PI3K/Akt and MAPK. miRNAs such as miR-21, miR-145, and miR-204 play key roles. Among them, miR-21 promotes the proliferation and migration of vascular smooth muscle cells, miR-145 inhibits the overproliferation and fibrosis of vascular smooth muscle cells, and miR-204 alleviates vascular remodeling by inhibiting TGF-β signaling. The combination of CRISPR gene editing and an exosome delivery system can precisely regulate miRNA expression, thus providing new therapeutic targets for pulmonary hypertension.

Keywords: pulmonary hypertension, TGF-β, miRNA, personalized therapy, CRISPR, Exosomes

Received: 20 Mar 2025; Accepted: 26 May 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Huang, Ma, Guo and Su. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Xiaoling Su, Qinghai Provincial People's Hospital, Xining, Qinghai Province, China

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