05.28.08

Rodeheaver and PluraGel

Posted in Biology at the University of Virginia, Jacob Canon, The Oscar Show, U.Va. Patent Foundation, UVa College of Arts & Sciences, University of Virginia, pharmaceutical, physical health, technology at 12:04 pm by Jacob Canon

In today’s show, written by Morgan Ellen Estabrook, outreach and communications manager for the U.Va. Patent Foundation, we look at Dr. George T. Rodeheaver and PluroGel™, his patented gel which reduces suffering and improves the recovery of burn victims and patients with chronic wounds.

The Edlich-Henderson Inventor of the Year award, the highest honor bestowed by the U.Va. Patent Foundation, recognizes an inventor or team of inventors each year whose technology has proven to be of notable value to society. This year, Dr. George T. Rodeheaver was honored May 19th at the UVa Patent Foundation’s annual awards banquet at the Boar’s Head Inn in Charlottesville.

Robert S. MacWright, executive director of the UVa Patent Foundation, said, “…Dr. Rodeheaver was chosen for this top honor because of his work to reduce the suffering and improve the recovery of burn victims and patients with chronic wounds. This work has made a big difference for patients at the U.Va. Health System, and Dr. Rodeheaver’s continued efforts will bring its benefits to patients everywhere.”

Dr. Rodeheaver, the Richard F. Edlich Professor of Biomedical Research, said he is especially thrilled to have been selected as the winner of an award named in part for his friend and long-time collaborator. “This award is not only an honor for me but also a tribute to Dr. Edlich, who has made so many contributions to emergency medicine over the years.”

Dr. Rodeheaver’s most notable invention is an ahead-of-its-time antimicrobial gel that has proven significantly more effective than existing therapies in treating severe burns and chronic wounds, such as diabetic ulcers, pressure ulcers and venous leg ulcers.

Trade-named PluroGel™, the topical treatment is unique in that it thickens at high temperatures (such as body temperature) and liquefies at cooler temperatures. As a result, PluroGel effectively delivers healing medication when applied to the body but is easily removed by cool water, making it much less painful to remove than existing therapies.

Dr. Rodeheaver’s innovative technology, for which he received a full U.S. patent in 1997, has been used to treat patients throughout the U.Va. Health System. More than 2,000 patients — some referred from up to 400 miles away to receive the treatment — have benefited from the invention.

Rodeheaver said, “The technology has had a dramatic impact so far. The fact is that in our burn center, we have been able to eliminate infection, which was the leading cause of death 15 years ago. And we have had great success in healing chronic wounds, many of which, with traditional remedies, had not healed for numerous years.”

Because of the level of success achieved within the U.Va. Health System, Rodeheaver has worked diligently to commercialize the technology through a start-up company, PluroGen Therapeutics Inc., which he founded with associate professor Adam J. Katz, M.D., also of the Department of Plastic Surgery. PluroGen is currently seeking Federal Drug Administration approval on the product so that it can be made available commercially to the public, beyond the University hospital.

After 36 years at the University and over 200 journal articles, Rodeheaver, who was filling out a grant application when he received word of his award said, he continues to enjoy pushing forward on the frontiers of science. According to the faculty member-cum-inventor and now entrepreneur, who considers himself to be “old-school. It is a new paradigm for me; it’s unique and exciting. Entrepreneurship in particular is something I see as a brand-new adventure.”

You’ve been listening to the Oscar Show, I’m Jacob Canon. Join us next week when our topic will well look at Dorrie K. Fontaine, recently named Dean of UVa’s School of Nursing, and her career advocating better care for critically ill patients.

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05.21.08

Girls and ADHD

Posted in Jacob Canon, Psychology, Social Psychology, The Oscar Show, UVa College of Arts & Sciences, University of Virginia, anxiety, pharmaceutical, physical health, sociology, stress at 11:04 am by Jacob Canon

In today’s show, adapted from an article published on the Oscar Web site written by Amber Davis, we look at UVA psychologist Amori Yee Mikami, her research of ADHD, and how intervening factors have made this disorder more complex and detrimental for young females.

In studies conducted on the effects of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in young children, researchers often turn to the most likely exhibitors of the impulsive and aggressive behaviors associated with the ailment — young males. What University of Virginia psychologist Amori Yee Mikami sought to uncover in researching ADHD, however, were the intervening factors that made this disorder more complex and detrimental for young females.

Mikami said, “We know a lot about boys with ADHD, partially because the disorder is three times more common in boys. Many research studies on ADHD have focused on how the disorder affects young boys. What I became interested in was how ADHD affected girls’ behaviors, particularly in adolescence.”

Since her original research at the University of California Berkley — where she found evidence supporting the hypothesis that ADHD contributes to social isolation — Mikami has focused on untangling the gender differences in children suffering with ADHD. Her most recent study, published in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology, concludes that girls with ADHD are at a greater risk for the binge eating and purging behaviors associated with bulimia nervosa.

Mikami said, “We know that children with ADHD have increased risk for delinquency, aggressive behavior problems, drug use and depression in adolescence, and now this study suggests they may also be at risk for an eating disorder problem. Since eating disorders are 10 times more common in females, and the effects of ADHD on girls are not as widely understood, the link between eating disorders and ADHD may have gone unnoticed or untreated.”

According to Mikami, the impulsive behaviors common in ADHD can make it difficult to maintain healthy eating habits and a healthy weight, leading girls to become self-conscious about their body image. Meanwhile, current ADHD medications on the market such as Ritalin may actually exacerbate the problem.

Mikami, who is currently conducting research to determine potential effects of these medications on bulimia nervosa symptoms said, “These drugs tend to make youth a little thinner because a common side effect of stimulant medications is appetite suppression. What I’m testing is whether this medicine is something that might discourage or encourage eating disorder problems.”

Mikami’s research plans include studying whether young males with ADHD have similar potential to develop eating disorders.

In addition to her ongoing research, Mikami oversees the “Friendship Clinic” in Charlottesville, which offers children with ADHD and their parents an eight-week program in which both parents and children learn how to cope with the disorder together. The clinic allows Mikami to observe how children with ADHD interact with their peers while introducing them to an environment that encourages typical social behavior.

Mikami said, “Early intervention is one of the most effective ways to combat the negative effects of ADHD. Girls with ADHD are often teased and rejected by their peers. Childhood peer problems seem to predict eating disorder symptoms in adolescence. Getting parents and teachers involved might help prevent these instances.”

You’ve been listening to the Oscar Show, I’m Jacob Canon. Join us next week when our topic will well look at Dr. George T. Rodeheaver and PluroGel™, his patented gel which reduces suffering and improves the recovery of burn victims and patients with chronic wounds.

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01.23.08

The HemoShear 2.0

Posted in Atherosclerosis, Cardiology, Jacob Canon, MRI, Skalak, The Oscar Show, UVa College of Arts & Sciences, Uncategorized, University of Virginia, biomedical engineering, pharmaceutical, physical health at 12:12 pm by Jacob Canon

A new device invented by researchers at the University of Virginia could save pharmaceutical companies significant time and money in screening potential new drug compounds. Brett Blackman, an assistant professor in biomedical engineering and Brian Wamhoff, assistant professor in the department of medicine; cardiovascular division, teamed up to create a novel system, the HemoShear 2.0, which, for the first time, offers researchers the ability to observe the behavior patterns of human vascular cells under a variety of blood flow conditions that occur inside the body’s cardiovascular system.

Dr. Blackman said, “We want to help the pharmaceutical industry identify effective therapeutic compounds by allowing them to fail early, fail fast and fail cheap before going to very expensive animal studies.”

Atherosclerosis, hardening or narrowing of the arteries, is considered the most important underlying cause of heart attack or stroke. The HemoShear 2.0 models the early indicators of atherosclerosis by placing actual human endothelial cells, the cells lining the interior of blood vessels, and smooth muscle cells, the cells found in the wall of blood vessels, in an environment that mimics an artery with blood flowing through it. Data from these exposures are recorded and measured to help test the efficacy of therapeutic compounds and aid in early stage toxicity studies. Instead of testing drug compounds on isolated cells, which can produce false negatives, drug companies can use the device to test compounds in a more realistic environment.

This kind of modeling offers unique opportunities to observe the cells and their interaction. This interaction is important because the cells lining the interior of the blood vessels recognize different blood flow patterns imposed upon them and respond by expressing or repressing genes. This, in turn, influences their interactions with the cells found in the walls of blood vessels. The researchers found these cell interactions may lead to the onset of early-inflammation-associated atherosclerosis in certain arteries.

MRI’s were used by researchers to determine the rhythmic pattern that blood flows through different arteries in human subjects. Blackman said, “We are then able to simulate the same flow patterns in those areas that are more or less susceptible to atherosclerosis and observe how the cells respond to these flow patterns in HemoShear.”

Using a synthetic elastic layer that is similar to a real blood vessel wall, endothelial cells are plated on the top surface and smooth muscle cells on the bottom surface. Then, the different blood flow patterns modeled from human circulation are applied to the endothelial cells through rotation of a motor-driven cone system. The findings: the blood flow can influence both endothelial and smooth muscle cell behaviors.

When subjected to atheroprotective blood flow patterns, the endothelial cells aligned with the direction of the blood flow, and the smooth muscle cells aligned perpendicularly to the flow as is true in a healthy blood vessel. In stark contrast, the atheroprone type of flow caused the endothelial cells to move away from their parallel structure while smooth muscle cells moved away from their perpendicular structure.

This remodeling mimics the early phases of the diseased state of the artery; the blood flow pattern associated with atheroprone areas resulted in inflammation in both cells reminiscent of early hallmarks of atherosclerosis. This was confirmed through evaluating gene and protein expression profiles in both cell types.

Thomas Skalak, professor and chair of the U.Va. Department of Biomedical Engineering said, “the results of this study validate the use of this novel co-culture system as a relevant biomimetic vascular model for studying early atherosclerotic events. The cells’ responses to these carefully controlled models of blood flow can now be used to develop therapeutic interventions for detection and treatment of vascular diseases. It has the potential to be revolutionary.”

You’ve been listening to the Oscar Show, I’m Jacob Canon. Join us next week as we again delve into the election season, when our topic will be the work of Bryan Pfaffenberger, associate professor at the University of Virginia’s School of Engineering and Applied Science and his study of mechanical-lever voting machines, their history and understanding the interaction between technology and culture that has been going on for more than a century…

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