Award Data

Modern pharmaceuticals have greatly improved the quality of life for many patients suffering a variety of illnesses. Unfortunately, among the 17 most commonly prescribed drugs, only 6 are highly effective for most patients, 5 have a modest effect, and 6 show little clinical effect. Worse still, unwanted illness and death from treatment of patients with the incorrect drug or dosage causes over 275, ...

Project Summary Pediatric myopia, also known as nearsightedness, is an eye condition in which one is unable to bring distant objects into proper focus. It is the leading cause of vision impairment in the world. The estimated economic impact of uncorrected refractive error is estimated to be a loss of $202 billion of global gross domestic product. The prevalence of myopia and high myopia are increa ...

Abstract Currently, clinically used drug abuse medications exist for treatment of addiction to opiates, alcohol, and nicotine, but not psychostimulants, such as methamphetamine (METH). Compounds that co-activate both nociceptin opioid peptide (NOP) and mu receptors have potential for treatment of drug abuse. In particular, buprenorphine, a partial mu agonist/kappa antagonist, which also acts as a ...

Project Summary The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has set guidelines for illicit drug monitoring for both screening and confirmatory tests. Point-of-care (POC) screening assays usually rely upon immunoassays that lack specificity among compounds in a given drug class. Confirmation testing usually employs chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry (MS), which i ...

Abstract Kidney cancer is the 8th most common cancer in the US population, of which clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) is the most common subtype. ccRCC is highly refractory to standard chemotherapy and radiation, and patients with advanced or metastatic tumors have a 5-year survival rate of just 14%. ccRCC is typically initiated by inactivation of the von Hippel Lindau (VHL) tumor suppressor ...

Project Summary Inflammatory bowel disease is a group of disorders (Crohn’s disease and Ulcerative Colitis) that are associated with substantial morbidity and disability for millions of people worldwide. Although multiple biologic agents and small molecules are approved for the treatment, anti-TNF monoclonal antibodies remain first line therapy. Yet, clinical benefit from these agents is lost ...

PROJECT SUMMARY—More than 2 million Americans are hospitalized each year with bone fractures, and many more undergo outpatient procedures for fracture reduction and fixation. Some injuries can be treated with closed reduction and splinting or casting to immobilize the bone during healing. However, at some sites, more than half of fractures require open reduction and internal fixation. Despite ad ...

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT In the United States, the postpartum period is a critical time for both maternal and child health; the US maternal mortality rate is the highest among other developed, high-income countries. More than half of all maternal deaths occur postpartum, from one day to one year after birth.1-9 There are vast racial and ethnic disparities in maternal mortality and severe morbidity ...

AbstractPositron emission tomography (PET, including PET/CT and PET/MRI) with 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) plays a key role in diagnosing and staging a wide variety of malignant tumors, assessing tumor grade, and evaluating response to therapy. The advent of other recently-approved tracers, particularly those with theranostic partners, is opening a new era of imaging where the uptake of PET tracer ...

PROJECT SUMMARY Inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD), Crohn’s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) are debilitating disorders that afflict ~1.3% of the U.S. population. Blockade of TNFα-driven inflammation with approved anti-TNFα biologics has been an effective IBD treatment for many patients. However, loss of efficacy due to anti-drug antibodies (ADAs) and toxicities such as serious infectio ...