NIH Awards Go to USC Researchers
Photo/Kukla Vera
Asatryan’s grant, a KO1 Mentored Research Scientist Development Award, is designed to support her research and development toward becoming an independent researcher in her own lab. This is the first time the School of Pharmacy has been awarded this type of grant from the NIH.
Asatryan’s four-year award of $450,000 will enable her to continue her work on alcoholism, specifically looking at purinergic receptors in the brain that are affected by alcohol.
“If we are able to fully understand how alcohol changes these receptors, we will then be able to work toward targeting these receptors to ward off the effects of alcohol,” Asatryan said. “My work is attempting to develop therapeutic agents that will treat either the cravings for alcohol or eliminate some of the behavioral effects of alcoholism.”
Asatryan works in the labs of professor Ronald Alkana and associate professor Daryl Davies at the School of Pharmacy. Alcoholism ranks as the nation’s top substance abuse problem. Affecting some 18 million Americans, the disease is annually responsible for more than 100,000 deaths and a financial toll of $185 billion.
Contreras won the Ruth L. Kirschstein Pre-Doctoral Fellowship, an NIH award created to promote diversity in health-related research. Contreras works in the lab of Sarah Hamm-Alvarez, the Gavin S. Herbert Professor in Pharmaceutical Sciences and chair of the Department of Pharmacology and Pharmaceutical Science.
Contreras’ fellowship provides $123,000 over three years, financing her work on the treatment of diseases of the eye. Specifically, Contreras will contribute to the Hamm-Alvarez lab’s focus on dry eye and Sjögren’s disease.
“My work focuses on diseases that target the lacrimal cells in the eye,” Contreras said. “We hope to find efficient ways to deliver medicines into the affected cells. Ultimately, this work may lead to treatments as well as cures for these ailments.”
By studying the role of the viral receptors in the eye’s lacrimal gland and how a virus travels into the gland, Contreras is trying to flip that delivery route and use it as a way for medicines to enter the affected eye molecules.
Approximately 10 million Americans suffer from dry-eye syndrome and as many as 4 million have Sjögren’s disease, an inflammation of the lacrimal glands that leads to decreased tear production.
Contreras’ grant provides funding for tuition, stipend and participation at academic conferences to present research findings. Contreras is chair of the USC student chapter of the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists.
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USC in the News
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The Chronicle of Higher Education mentioned USC’s $6 billion fundraising campaign. The story noted that USC had already raised $1 billion in a “quiet phase,” including the $200 million naming gift from USC Trustee and alumnus David Dornsife and wife Dana Dornsife to the USC Dornsife College.
The Guardian (U.K.) highlighted two major gifts to USC in a list of the 10 biggest philanthropic benefactors in America. The list included the $200 million naming gift from USC Trustee and alumnus David Dornsife and wife Dana Dornsife to the USC Dornsife College, and the $110 million gift from USC Trustee and USC Viterbi School alumnus John Mork and wife Julie to create the USC Mork Family Scholars Program.
The New York Times featured the USC U.S.-China Institute documentary “Assignment: China — The Week that Changed the World.” The documentary, part of a series, examines media coverage of the 1972 Nixon trip that reshaped U.S.-China relations after a quarter century of isolation and hostility. “People look back now and take it for granted that the outcome was preordained,” said the institute’s Mike Chinoy, who produced the documentary. Voice of America also featured the story.
Los Angeles Times featured the Oscar Senti-meter, a tool developed by the USC Annenberg School, Los Angeles Times and IBM that analyzes thousands of tweets about the Academy Awards nominees. The story noted that Mexican actor Demian Bechir received an enormous boost on Twitter the day of the nominations, with a total of 6,893 tweets mentioning him, a 47-fold increase from the day before. The story noted the tool uses language-recognition technology developed in collaboration with USC Viterbi School’s Signal Analysis and Interpretation Lab.
The Times of India (India) featured a three-day medical emergency training workshop organized in association with USC. At the workshop, held at GCS Medical College in India, 50 doctors and more than 100 paramedics learned how to improve emergency support systems. William Mallon of the Keck School of USC said that discussion topics included the use of portable ultrasonic devices to scan patients. “The ultrasound applications help physicians make accurate and timely decisions,” he noted. Daily News & Analysis (India) also featured the workshop.
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