cardiology
Definition
Cardiology is the medical specialty focused on the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disorders affecting the heart and cardiovascular system. In biomedical research, cardiology encompasses the study of cardiac physiology, pathophysiology of heart diseases including coronary artery disease, heart failure, arrhythmias, and cardiomyopathies, as well as the molecular mechanisms underlying cardiovascular function. Research in cardiology integrates genetics, proteomics, metabolomics, and systems biology to understand disease progression, identify biomarkers, and develop therapeutic interventions. The field is increasingly data-driven, utilizing multi-omics approaches to map complex interactions between genes, proteins, and signaling pathways that regulate cardiac health and disease states.
Visualize cardiology in Nodes Bio
Researchers can visualize complex cardiovascular disease networks by mapping interactions between cardiac risk genes, protein complexes, signaling cascades, and metabolic pathways. Nodes Bio enables integration of multi-omics data to identify key regulatory hubs in heart failure progression, visualize drug-target interactions for cardiovascular therapeutics, and explore causal relationships between genetic variants and cardiac phenotypes through network-based pathway analysis.
Visualization Ideas:
- Cardiac gene regulatory networks showing transcription factors controlling heart development and disease
- Protein-protein interaction maps of sarcomere complexes and calcium signaling pathways in cardiomyocytes
- Drug-target networks for cardiovascular medications showing polypharmacology and off-target effects
Example Use Case
A research team investigating hypertrophic cardiomyopathy integrates GWAS data with protein-protein interaction networks to identify disease-associated genes. They map 47 candidate genes onto known cardiac signaling pathways, revealing unexpected connections between sarcomere proteins and calcium handling machinery. Network analysis identifies three central hub proteins as potential therapeutic targets. The team then overlays drug-target data to discover existing compounds that modulate these hubs, prioritizing candidates for repurposing in cardiomyopathy treatment based on network proximity scores.