Blood clots that form on implanted medical devices such as catheters and heart valves can curtail the lifetimes of the devices and possibly lead to health complications. Antithrombotic agents could prevent such clots, but scientists have yet to find a suitable way to provide a long-lasting, steady supply of those agents. As a possible solution, Teng Xue, Xiangfeng Duan, and Yu Huang of UCLA; Mark E. Meyerhoff of the University of Michigan; and coworkers have developed a catalytic system that generates the antithrombotic agent nitroxyl (HNO) from species commonly found in blood (Nat. Commun. 2014, DOI: 10.1038/ncomms4200).

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