Impact and influence of “omics” technology on hyper tension studies

Background Hypertension is an important risk factor for cardiovascular diseases. Pathophysiology and molecular mechanisms involved in hypertension regulation are not very well known. Recently, high-throughput Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) technology has identified hundreds of gene loci associated with multiple cardiovascular pathologies, including blood pressure (BP), generating new expectations in hypertension studies, revealing new pathways and genetic mechanisms underlying BP regulation. This review summarizes genomic and proteomic information in the main organs affected by hypertension, highlighting several approaches used in hypertension detection and discussing the future in hypertension treatment and prevention. Methods We performed an extensive electronic search in pubmed and public dabase catalogs looking for studies related to the population hypertension genome and proteome, and next generation sequencing, performed in the main organs affected by hypertension and we selected studies that presented results and / or information relevant. Results We selected 400 articles. A hundred-sixteen were scrutinized and included in the review. Twelve proteomic studies performed in human samples and eleven in animal samples, (23 in total) were considered to select a protein list involved in hypertension control. Conclusions This review demonstrates that “omics technologies” contributed to identify new biomarkers which could be used as drug targets and therapeutic agents and to understand hypertension pathogenesis. New technologies will help us to understand the disease, however, many results are currently not replicable. High-throughput technology has identified many SNPs involved in BP regulation. Some of them have been replicated and validated and they may become targets for new drugs to regulate blood pressure.