New Delhi. July 27: After spending eight years tinkering with blood clots, Indian biologist Girish Sahni has engineered a protein molecule that could emerge as a novel clot-buster to treat heart attacks.

And India-born, US-based scientist-turned-entrepreneur Nirmal Mulye has decided to try and hoist this protein out of the laboratory and into the market as an alternative to existing clot-busters.

Mulye’s New Jersey-based Nostrum Pharmaceuticals today acquired global rights for the commercialisation of the new protein developed by Sahni and his colleagues at the Institute of Microbial Technology (IMTECH) in Chandigarh.

The protein is designed to dissolve blood clots that block arteries in heart attacks. But unlike existing clot-busters, it acts only on clots and leaves the rest of the blood alone, reducing the risk of bleeding.

“This is a rare example of an innovative drug molecule designed by an Indian lab attracting a foreign drug company,” said Raghunath Mashelkar, director-general of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR). IMTECH is a CSIR lab.

In recent decades, clot-busters such as streptokinase, urokinase, and tissue-plasminogen activator have dramatically improved survival rates among patients with heart attacks. Such clot-busters dissolve clots that block blood flow in the arteries during heart attacks, but they act not just on clots but other blood molecules which might lead to bleeding, a serious side-effect.

“Existing streptokinase action is something like setting a kitchen on fire to bake a cake,” said Sahni, director of IMTECH. The new protein his research team has designed remains inactive in the blood until it encounters a clot.

It is a genetically-engineered protein created by stitching a streptokinase molecule to another naturally-occurring human blood protein. In this “hybrid” form, it seeks out and binds to blood clots, where it is activated to dissolve the clot.

IMTECH has already obtained a European patent for the protein and has staked patent claims in India and the US. But the scientists have not published their findings in peer-reviewed scientific journals yet.

But the protein still has several hurdles to clear before it can hit the market. Its safety and efficacy would need to be established through tests on laboratory animals. It would also need to pass through human trials.