The goal of this proposal is to provide an intellectually and educationally stimulating research environment that will maximize the opportunity for the applicant, a minority school faculty member with some prior training in cardiovascular research, to establish an independent research program at his sponsoring institution and will encourage his academic career development. To accomplish these goals, the applicant will work closely with investigators in the mentors' laboratories on a project that explores the contribution of vasoactive products of neutrophils to changes in vascular tone in normal and balloon catheter-injured rabbit arteries.
The aims of this project are to determine if nitric oxide alters agonist- induced adhesive interactions of neutrophils with proteins or endothelium, to define pharmacologically the vasoactive substance(s) from unactivated and activated neutrophils that modulate tension in rabbit aortic or carotid artery rings or perfused segments, and to characterize the differences in response of rabbit aortic and carotid neointima (vs. normal intima) to vasoactive agents and neutrophils at various times after a single or repeat balloon-catheter injury of the artery. Participation in several components of this complex project will allow the applicant to become familiar with the biochemical, pharmacologic and immunologic techniques currently used in the mentors' research laboratories including assessment of neutrophil adhesive, oxidative and secretory functions in vitro, evaluation of the interaction between neutrophils and cultured endothelium or vascular smooth muscle, quantification of basal and agonist-induced release of vasoactive factors from neutrophils or from cultured endothelium and vascular smooth muscle. Since these research methods are applicable to the study of the wide variety of cardiovascular pathophysiologic conditions, the applicant will be encouraged to become expert in those that can be practically established in his sponsoring institution. As part of his intensive research experience during the summer months and less intensive participation in laboratory activities during the academic year, the applicant will be afforded the opportunity to actively participate in numerous formal and informal research project discussions with other faculty, fellows, students and visiting scientists, to attend research seminars by visiting scientists that are applicable to his own research, and to travel to at least one national meeting per year to present research results. He will also be encouraged during his first year to attend a formal graduate course in cardiovascular sciences that covers a wide range of topics from molecular biology of the cardiomyocyte to integrated neurovascular control mechanisms. It is anticipated that, as the applicant's research skills develop, he will become progressively more independent such that he will have submitted a grant application and be ready to begin an independent research career at his sponsoring institution upon completion of his training.
| Akpaffiong, M J; Taylor, A A (1998) Antihypertensive and vasodilator actions of antioxidants in spontaneously hypertensive rats. Am J Hypertens 11:1450-60 |
