PB1094 - Multi-technique study of the role of fibrinogen and thrombin in clot formation and structure

Background: Altered clot structure has been linked with several diseases and can lead to a heart attack or stroke. To study the individual effect of clot conditions, researchers analyze clots with purified fibrinogen, as it allows for the determination of the effect of individual components without the confounding effects of other proteins present in blood. However, it has been found that clots made with purified fibrinogen and plasma have some differences in clot polymerization and final clot structure. Most literature studying clot properties have investigated either clots made from either purified fibrinogen or plasma, but not both, and for the works that have investigated both, they have only looked at a single fibrinogen or thrombin concentration and only analyzed the differences with a single experimental method.

Aims: This work expands upon previous works to narrow down the differences between clots made with plasma and clots made with purified fibrinogen and how varying fibrinogen concentration and activation factor concentration affect the clot polymerization and final clot structure for both.

Methods: A combination of SEM imaging, confocal imaging, turbidity, and turbidimetry is used to characterize clot structure and polymerization.

Results: We find that while the general trends in clot and fiber structure are the same with increasing fibrinogen and thrombin for both purified fibrinogen and plasma clots, there are differences in the polymerization and how drastically the different parameters are influenced by changing concentrations.

Conclusion(s): While purified fibrinogen can be used for determining the trends a certain condition has on the structure of fibrin fibers in physiological conditions, additional studies with plasma could be required to infer actual structural and polymerization values. This work highlights the distinct differences in experimental procedures with varying sample conditions as well as the technique used for analysis.