When the University of Nebraska Medical Center broke its record for
total research grants in a single quarter by bringing in $26 million during
July, August and September, it was a tribute to the universitys rise in
innovative research projects and its ability to recruit top investigators.
UNMC is fortunate that so many investigators are engaging in innovative
research, said Thomas Rosenquist, Ph.D., UNMC vice chancellor for research.
It is also important that the university has been able to hire so many
of the best and brightest researchers in the country. During this first
quarter, we had 40 research projects funded for $100,000 or more.
David Bylund, Ph.D., UNMC professor of pharmacology, received a three-year,
$497,000 grant funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
to develop laboratory animal models for testing antidepressants designed
for children and adolescents.
There are no established juvenile rodent animal models of clinical
depression, Dr. Bylund said. We have reasonable rodent animal models
for adults that predict more than 90 percent of how well drugs work in
adult humans, but no one to this point has looked at models in the young
animal to see what drugs might be effective in children and adolescents.
An important difference between clinical depression in children and adolescents,
as compared to adults, is the response to anti-depressant drugs.
One of UNMCs newest researchers is Christine Eischen, Ph.D., assistant
professor, Eppley Cancer Institute. She received a grant for $1.47 million
over five years from the National Institutes of Health.
The focus of my research is to identify and characterize specific genes
that regulate lymphoma development, Dr. Eischen said. We utilize mouse
models that mimic important aspects of human lymphoma and biochemical and
molecular approaches to evaluate genes of interest. Determining the
function of the identified genes in a living organism is critical to understand
the physiological role that specific genes have in normal cell growth and
survival and how these genes are then altered in cancer.
The goal of our research is to increase understanding of how lymphoma
develops, which should lead to improved therapeutics for the treatment
of lymphoma.
On the other hand, Irving Zucker, Ph.D, Theodore F. Hubbard Professor
of Cardiovascular Research and chairman, department of physiology and biophysics,
is one of the universitys most senior researchers.
He received nearly $2 million to study chronic heart failure.
Heart failure is a disorder that is growing in epidemic proportions
in the United States, Dr. Zucker said. This is due, in part, to an aging
population and to medicine’s ability to enhance survival from acute events
such as heart attacks and rhythm disturbances. Our project is designed
to study the relationships between the nervous system and the circulatory
system in animal models of chronic heart failure. Because the nervous system
is responsible for changes in heart rate and in the force of the contraction
of the heart and blood vessels, over activity of this portion of the nervous
system contributes to a worsening of the heart failure state.
Our studies will elucidate the cellular and molecular mechanisms that
contribute to the increased nervous activity. We will investigate these
mechanisms in the brain and in the peripheral circulation. Finally, we
will determine the role of exercise training on alterations in these mechanisms
and on the changes in heart function that exercise training effects in
our models of heart failure. These studies will lead to an enhanced understanding
of the mechanisms responsible for the continual deterioration of the cardiovascular
system in chronic heart failure patients.
Keith Mueller, Ph.D., professor, department of preventive and society
medicine, received $1.2 million to establish a center for rural health
policy.
The RUPRI (Rural Policy Research Institute) Center for Rural Health
Policy Analysis conducts several small scale studies designed to help shape
public policy, Dr. Mueller said.
Projects funded for the current year include: examining reasons
for increases in health care costs in rural areas; developing a methodology
for selecting rural communities to participate in a special project to
monitor changes in health care delivery and other services in those communities;
simulating the effects of changes in Medicare payment on physician practice
revenues; and assessing the development of Medicare preferred provider
organizations in rural areas.
The center performed an analysis of the differences in Medicare payments
to physicians in rural areas compared to physicians in urban areas, and
the data was helpful in determining an acceptable payment for physicians
and included in the Medicare prescription drug legislation. The center
also performed an analysis of health insurance plans participating in the
Federal Employment Health Benefits Plan.