Health

The personalized diagnosis, prognosis and treatment of cancer.

My research develops new clinical trial and experimental study designs to allow 'learning from data' more efficiently. My research also develops new analysis methods to understand latent structure in data. This allows better understanding of disease processes, better targeting of existing treatments, and development of more effective new treatments. Finally, I am developing new statistical methods based on prediction of future events.

Unravel the phylodynamics and transmission-specific determinants of emerging plant virus/fastidious bacteria-insect vector complexes, and translate new knowledge to abate pathogen spread in food systems.

Peptides and proteins play a vital role in almost every cellular process in living organisms. Our research discovers and determines structural information on peptides and proteins to design drugs to more effectively treat human disease.

Dr. Connick is a physician scientist who has dedicated her career to the improvement of health of individuals living with or at risk for HIV-1 infection. Her research ranges from laboratory based investigations of HIV-1 immunopathogenesis to clinical and epidemiological studies of novel immunotherapies and other interventions to improve health outcomes in people living with HIV-1.

We investigate how the chemicals in our daily lives interact with the female reproductive system and influence fertility. We hope that our discoveries will help reduce the incidence of infertility and improve women's health.

Xinxin Ding, PhD, department head, Pharmacology and Toxicology, College of Pharmacy—studies enzyme function, regulation and genetics as applied to translational research for drug safety and efficacy and genetic and environmental risks for chemical toxicity. Author of nearly 200 peer-reviewed papers, book chapters and articles, he serves as associate editor for “Drug Metabolism and Disposition” and “Acta Pharmaeutica Sinica B.” Grants from the National Cancer Institute and National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences of the National Institute of Health fund his work, in part. Former chair of the NIH XNDA study section (2016-2018), he currently chairs (2018-19) Drug Metabolism and Disposition Division of the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics..

I am investigating a human connective tissue disorder in mice. I am also investigating the role of gut bacteria in colon cancer risk in both a mouse model of colon cancer and in humans with colon cancer.

Approximately 795,000 Americans suffer a stroke each year, and 400,000 will experience long-term disability. The number of stroke survivors in the population is expected to double by 2025. Currently, treatments for stroke patients are limited to tissue plasminogen activator (TPA), but its use is limited to the first few hours after stroke. Therefore, the goal of our research is to develop new therapeutics that can promote repair and recovery in this rapidly growing population.

Brian Erstad’s research interests pertain to critical care medicine with an emphasis on patient safety and related outcomes research.

Janet Funk's work includes a focus on metastatic breast cancer that spans the research spectrum from bench to bedside, translational arthritis studies of the pharmacokinetics and safety of turmeric, and collaborative endocrinological studies evaluating the effects of obesity and insulin resistance on bone development in Hispanic girls, as well as effects of obesity on breast cancer risk in older women.

Valley Fever (coccidioidomycosis) occurs more in Arizona than anywhere else. My research and others at the Valley Fever Center for Excellence involve understanding how disease is caused by infection, how the immune system stops or prevents illness, and how we can better diagnose, treat, or prevent this public health problem.

Vijay Gokhale's work includes the use of medicinal chemistry in the development of small molecule therapeutics for neuropathic pain, idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), and acute lung injury and cancer.

Stefano Guerra's work includes an epidemiologic study, which used a household-based approach to assess prevalence and longitudinal changes in respiratory health. Other biomarker projects include a study on molecular biomarkers of asthma and COPD from the European Community Respiratory Health Survey.

I recently joined the U. of A community as the Vice Chair of Research for OB-GYN. I consider myself a clinical trialist and have conducted multiple randomized controlled trial. The most important contributions of my work has been to the use of antenatal corticosteroids for pregnancies at risk for preterm delivery. Prematurity prevention, optimizing outcomes, and developing evidence based strategies to reduce the burden of prematurity.

Discovery of natural products from plants and their associated microorganisms as potential drugs to treat cancer. Application of medicinal chemistry approach for structure-activity relationship studies and to obtain compounds for preclinical evaluation. Development of alternative agricultural systems for sustainable utilization of natural resources.

We are involved in banking clinical specimens obtained from various patients for use in biomarker discovery and clinical therapies. Clinical therapies may include regenerative medicine, transplant or gene therapy.

The long-term goal of research in my lab is to understand the molecular mechanisms of muscle contraction. I am especially interested in how contractile proteins of muscle sarcomeres regulate the force and speed of contraction in the heart. The question is important from both basic science and clinical perspectives because mutations in sarcomere proteins of muscle are a leading cause of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), the most common cause of sudden cardiac death in the young and a prevalent cause of heart failure in adults. Myosin binding protein-C (MyBP-C) is a muscle regulatory protein that speeds actomyosin cycling kinetics in response to adrenaline (b-adrenergic stimuli) and is one of the two most commonly affected proteins linked to HCM. Currently, the major research focus in my lab is understanding the mechanisms by which cMyBP-C regulates contractile speed and mechanisms by which mutations in cMyBP-C cause disease.

Our lab is focused on the development of novel peptides to inhibit this inflammatory cascade and improve brain blood flow. These peptides are designed to significantly improve serum half-life and penetrate the blood-brain-barrier. These peptides act to inhibit the inflammatory pathways at both the level of brain blood vessels and the brain itself.

My research is directed at producing enhanced traits in soybean that improves its use and sustainability to provide for growing global needs. In soybeans have produced enhanced seeds that contain much more protein content while minimizing or eliminating several food allergens and anti-nutritional proteins. This will provide better food and animal feed.

Melanie Hingle's work focuses on understanding determinants of energy balance behaviors (i.e. how and why behaviors are initiated and sustained), and identifying contributors to the success of interventions (i.e. when, where, and how interventions should be delivered) are critical steps toward developing programs that effectively change behavior, thereby mitigating unhealthy weight gain and promoting optimal health. Current projects include: Determinants of metabolic risk, and amelioration of risk, in pediatric cancer survivors, Guided imagery intervention delivered via a mobile software application to increase healthy eating and physical activity in weight-concerned women smokers, and Family-focused diabetes prevention program delivered in partnership with the YMCA.

The Horton lab uses biophysical, biochemical, and molecular biology to study protein-DNA interactions and filament formation by enzymes. Current projects include the investigation of mechanisms of disease caused by the Human Parvovirus B19, and advantages of filament formation by enzymes such as the sequence specific DNA endonuclease SgrAI, and the important metabolic enzyme PFK.

The Hulme group is focused on small molecule drug design and developing enabling chemical methodologies to expedite the drug discovery process. The development of small molecule inhibitors of kinases is of particular interest.

Augmenting immune responses to cancer. Reducing relapse and graft versus host disease after hematopoietic cell transplantation.

Chelsea Kidwell specializes in prevention and treatment of stroke. She has special interests in medical imaging and stroke as well as ethnic and racial disparities among stroke patients.

My research examines neural factors which affect language functions, and how these change across life-span and are influenced by stroke, brain injury and neurodegenerative disorders. In my work, I use combination of cognitive measures and multimodal neuroimaging techniques (fMRI, EEG/ERPs, MEG). I am also interested in recovery of function, and treatment approaches involving speech-language therapy in combination with noninvasive brain stimulation techniques.

I use human genetic data to find associations of genetic markers with complex traits and diseases, to shed light on disease pathophysiology, causal pathways, and health disparities, and to inform precision medicine.

We study how a common intracellular parasite, Toxoplasma gondii, persists in, and potentially changes, the mammalian brain. Understanding the Toxoplasma-brain interaction offers the opportunity to develop better therapies to treat toxoplasmosis as well as giving new insights into how to manipulate the brain immune response which has been implicated in many neurodegenerative diseases.

Monica Kraft's research focus is in the areas of adult asthma, the role of infection in asthma and the role of the distal lung in asthma and airway remodeling.

We are interested in the effects of early life exposures to environmental toxicants on lung growth and development. We determine if the early life exposures leads to adult disease.

Jonathan Lifshitz's research questions primarily investigate traumatic brain injury as a disease process that dismantles, repairs and regenerates circuits in the brain. The underlying principle is that adaptive repair and regeneration fail, leaving a miswired brain and neurological impairments that decrease quality of life.

Kirsten Limesand's research program has its foundation in radiation-induced salivary gland dysfunction; mechanisms of damage, clinical prevention measures, and restoration therapies. They utilize a number of techniques including: genetically engineered mouse models, real-time RT/PCR, immunoblotting, immunohistochemistry, primary cultures, siRNA transfections, and procedures to quantitate salivary gland physiology and integrate this information in order to understand the complete system.

Purnima Madhivanan is an epidemiologist and biomedical researcher examining the intersection of infectious diseases and cancer using -omics technology. Her current work is examining the vaginal and gut microbiome and their role in women's reproductive health. She has conducted several large mixed methods epidemiological studies in the US and internationally.

We seek to produce new drugs that harness molecules produced during the natural immune response in order to treat cancer and pain. Such compounds may also provide new treatments for heart failure and alcoholism.

Renquist Lab Research aims to address the causes and consequent diseases of obesity. To this end we have research focused on 1) type 2 diabetes and obesity associated hypertension, 2) development of effective, ligand-directed, chemotherapeutic for cancer, and 3) central nervous system control of visceral blood flow and food intake.

My laboratory aims to identify the genetic and environmental reasons that certain individuals are predisposed to develop complex diseases like heart disease. We use new technologies, experimental, and computational approaches to identify molecular patterns indicative of disease predisposition.

The aims of our efforts are to elucidate the science of nutrient-responsive sensing and signaling processes in human systems and to rationally apply this knowledge in development of effective interventions. We apply three approaches in these endeavors; namely: 1. Integrative omics to: a) characterize | catalog structural chemistry and molecular dynamics of nutrient-responsive human systems (receptors, transporters, enzymes and hormones); and, b) determine functional implications of structural variation in elements of these systems. 2. Physiological optics to characterize in vivo human response to nutrient intake (tissue status change and retinal | visual function). 3. Ultra-structural | membrane | organoid biophysics to identify modifiable ('druggable') mechanisms and rate-limiting steps of nutrient sensing | signaling in human retina and brain.

We are studying how tumor cells escape immunosurveillance, a hallmark of cancer, in aggressive lymphomas. MHCII is a protein important for immunosurveillance. We are studying the underlying mechanisms of altered regulation of MHCII in lymphoma cells and its effects on tumor immunosurveillance.

My research focus is on functional foods—designing crops to deliver more than mere calories—by both adding nutritional compounds and eliminating anti-nutritional compounds. I work on enhancing seeds of two of the most globally important crops, soybean and corn.

Our research efforts focus on bacteria that cause serious healthcare-associated infections, and those associated with antibiotic use. This infections disproportiOur federally-funded research focuses on infection prevention. Specifically, we study diseases such as Clostridium difficile Infection that affect populations worldwide ("One-Health" issue). Our current efforts are aimed at translating bench-research findings to the bedside. We have recently been awarded two patents for a novel biologic agent invention aimed at preventing bacterial infections in humans as well as food animals.onately affect the elderly, and those with compromised immune systems. One overarching goal of our studies is to develop safe, cost-effective, non-antibiotic interventions to prevent and treat bacterial diarrheas.

Around the world, diarrhea kills ninety children every hour. My laboratory uses the latest technology to understand how bacteria cause diarrhea in children. In addition to providing clues for new ways to prevent disease, our research helps us understand how the body maintains good health.

I conduct research at the nexus of ecotoxicology, mechanisms of toxicity, and health disparities. I study wildlife and laboratory animals as models for human exposure and disease, as well as to solve problems in conservation biology. I am especially interested in health disparities experienced by vulnerable populations and I employ a Community Based Participatory Research (CBPR) approach. I integrate a variety of methods to establish routes of exposure and mechanisms of developmental disruption ranging from the genome to the whole organism and its environment.

We develop cutting-edge imaging technology, integrating light, ultrasound and electricity, to diagnose and treat diseases ranging from epilepsy to breast cancer. Novel sources for ultrasound contrast include optical and microwave absorption, mechanical strain, and electrical current. We visualize electrical brain “stormsˮ during uncontrollable seizures and envision “smartˮ photoacoustic agents that seek-and-destroy deadly tumors.

Dr. Wung is an Associate Professor in the College of Nursing and an acute care nurse practitioner. She has more than 20 years of clinical research experience in the effective and safe use of health technologies and big data to provide precision monitoring strategies for cardiovascular and acute illnesses.

We are working to uncover the molecular mechanisms of aging and neurodegenerative diseases using a combination of genetic, computational and pharmacological tools, and a diverse array of experimental models. We also seek to develop therapies for ALS and related neurodegenerative diseases.