Award Data

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): About 28.3 million Americans have type II diabetes (T2D) and over 40.1% of middle-aged adults have prediabetes, a condition characterized by impaired glucose tolerance and insulin resistance. Current antidiabetic medications are effective in improving insulin sensitivity, but their chronic administration has significant side effects suc as cardiovascular compli ...

Aerosolized pathogenssuch as Influenza virusescan spread rapidly and silently throughout a populationcausing severe outbreaks that can be difficult to controlEarly detection of these airborne pathogens is key to controlling outbreaksespecially among vulnerable populations such as in hospitalstreatment centers or nursing homesYet available methods are neither rapidnor portableCurrent methods rely h ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE:

Methamphetamine use disorder is associated with damage to regions of the brain that control cognitive and psychiatric functionOne third to one half of adults with methamphetamine use disorder experience cognitive impairments and other psychiatric symptoms that significantly impact treatment outcomesincreased relapse and lower treatment retention ratesMounting evidence demonstrates how immune facto ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Prostate cancer is the second most common cancer in men, and the second leading cause of cancer death. However, when prostate cancer is diagnosed in its early stages, it can be effectively treated and cured. Combined with the digital rectal examination, the prostate specific antigen (PSA) test has been widely used to detect prostate cancer in its early stages. ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Preeclampsia, a hypertensive disorder of pregnancy, is a leading cause of maternal and neonatal morbidity and mortality around the world, responsible for approximately 76,000 maternal and 500,000 infant deaths per year.As a heterogeneous and poorly understood disorder, its pathogenesis and possible treatments are an area of active research. While the majority o ...

DESCRIPTION: New therapeutic agents are urgently needed for the treatment of sickle cell disease (SCD), the world's most common genetic disease. Our long-term goal is to develop a drug for use in children that prevents the inexorable progression of SCD. SCD affects approximately 100,000 people in the United States and millions worldwide. It kills more children in Africa than HIV, but while HI ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Counteracting the threat of intoxication by organophosphorus nerve agents (OP's) is an important mission for homeland security as well as for treating workers exposed to pesticides. OP's act on acetylcholinesterase to prevent synaptic inactivation, thereby leading to immobilization and death on sustained application. Currently, the most promising stra ...

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): While there is no doubt smoking is a direct causative factor underlying the development of lung cancer, not every smoker develops lung cancer. In fact, only 10-15% of smokers develop this disease, indicating that otherfactors make certain individuals more susceptible to cancer. A number of single nucleotide polymorphisms are known to correlate with the developm ...

Project Summary AbstractThe recent rapid expansion of genomic data greatly contributes to the understanding of disease development and progressionTo translate these genetic discoveries into clinical applicationswe need to develop therapeutic platforms that can specifically modulate the expression of disease related genes in vivoSmall RNAssuch as microRNAs and siRNAs function in messenger RNA silen ...