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Severe early-onset preeclampsia has confounded doctors for more than 2,000 years. It can strike as early as 20 weeks into pregnancy, sending blood pressure soaring and putting both the mother and baby at risk.

A Wright State University team led by pregnancy researcher Thomas L. Brown, Ph.D., may have identified a key piece of the puzzle—and a possible way to treat it without medication.

The team discovered that women with severe early-onset preeclampsia have far more circulating extracellular vesicles—tiny particles released by cells—than women with healthy pregnancies. When researchers reduced those particle levels to normal in laboratory testing, the blood vessel dysfunction associated with preeclampsia disappeared.

"It was so exciting," said Brown, the associate chair for research and a professor in the Department of Neuroscience, Cell Biology and Physiology, and professor of obstetrics and gynecology. "What this means is, in a severe preeclamptic, if you can just reduce the number of these circulating extracellular vesicles, you can prevent endothelial dysfunction—the blood vessel formation will be fine, and you should be able to reduce the blood pressure and alleviate the condition."

Preeclampsia is a leading cause of maternal and infant illness and death worldwide. It develops in the placenta during pregnancy and can lead to a sudden and life-threatening increase in the mother's blood pressure, putting her and her baby at serious risk.

The team's findings , published in Hypertension , the leading journal serving the international hypertension community, were selected for the September cover.

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