AMSBIO has collaborated with a team of international biomedical researchers to investigate the expression and activity of hyaluronidases (HYAL-1, 2, and 3) in human intervertebral spinal discs.
Hyaluronic acid is critical for water retention of the intervertebral disc (IVD) enabling flexibility and shock absorbance in the crucial areas of the spine. Hyaluronic acid is degraded by hyaluronidases (HYALs), and the resulting fragments have been demonstrated to induce an inflammatory and catabolic response in human IVD cells. Until this study, no data had existed on the expression and activity of HYALs in IVD research.
"The HYAL activity kit (Ra003-01-HAK) supplied by AMSBIO helped us to move from purely analyzing HYAL (gene/protein) expression to actually measuring HYAL activity. When investigating enzymes, such a functional read-out is crucial. While well-established methods and kits exist for other enzymes such as MMPs, determining HYAL activity is more complicated. Although our treatments did not result in a significant increase in HYAL activity, we found the assay to be reliable and very easy to use" said Professor Karin Wuertz-Kozak from the Rochester Institute of Technology. She continued, "Our study showed for the first time that HYAL-1, HYAL-2 and HYAL-3, the three major HA-degrading enzymes, are expressed in IVD issue and isolated cells. Interestingly, HYAL-1 expression was increased with increasing degeneration, although this was only observed on the mRNA level, but not on the protein level."