Pulmonary Hypertension in COPD : from Observation to Emerging Novel therapeutic Insights and eXploration

Objective

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) affects over 480 million people worldwide and accounts for more than 3 million deaths each year. Pulmonary hypertension is a common vascular complication observed in approximately 30% of COPD patients, characterized by vascular dysfunction and associated with higher hospitalization rates, impaired quality of life, and significantly reduced survival. To date, no clinical trial has demonstrated a clear benefit of pharmacological therapies for this severe complication, and only surgical interventions offer clinical improvement. Despite its substantial clinical impact, the mechanisms underlying the development of pulmonary hypertension in COPD remain poorly understood, thereby limiting effective clinical management and the advancement of novel therapeutic strategies. Through my project, I propose an integrative and innovative interdisciplinary approach that bridges clinical and experimental research. Using a database of COPD patients with and without pulmonary hypertension, together with a biobank of matched plasma and lung tissue samples, the project is structured around four main objectives to better understand the development of pulmonary hypertension in COPD: (i) define key clinical and functional risk factors (ii) identify circulating and tissue-based molecular signatures through multiomics analysis (iii) investigate vascular dysfunction using patient-derived cell models (iv) uncover potential new therapeutic targets capable of restoring normal vascular function By combining my host institution expertise in omics and large-scale data analysis with my experimental expertise in vascular biology and cellular models, this project will deliver mechanistic insight and translational outputs to improve patient management.