Research News

Sonja received an F31 predoctoral fellowship award from the National Institutes of Health/National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism for her project “LncRNA Gas5 Dysregulation Alters Ethanol Drinking Behavior and Ethanol-Related Phenotypes.”

Charles Lin, MD, was accepted into the Pitt Ventures First Gear Program for his device concept, the Ignite Safe Electrocautery Pen to reduce operating room fires.

Annalisa Baratta from the lab of Gregg E. Homanics, PhD, and co-mentored by Sean P. Farris, PhD, received an F31 predoctoral fellowship award from the National Institutes of Health/National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism for her project “The Role of lncRNA MALAT1 in Controlling Behavior and Neuroinflammation in Alcohol Use Disorder.”

A paper from the lab of Pei Tang, PhD, “Structures of Highly Flexible Intracellular Domain of Human α7 Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptor,” was published in the high-impact journal Nature Communications.

The National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) of the National Institutes of Health has notified us that our National Research Service Award Institutional Research Training Grant (T32) will be continuously funded for a fourth five-year term, with an increase of training slots from three to four positions beginning July 1, 2022.

Congratulations to Gregg E. Homanics, PhD, who was recently named a Specialty Chief Editor for the section Methods and Model Organisms for the journal Frontiers in Molecular Neuroscience.

A paper from the labs of Yan Xu, PhD, and Pei Tang, PhD, in partnership with collaborators at Temple University, University of Pennsylvania, and Shanghai Jiaotong University, was published this month in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Building upon the Peter and Eva Safar Lectureship established in 1980, this yearly event honors the late Dr. Peter Safar and his wife Eva for their contributions to the scientific community and highlights current research in areas spanning Dr. Safar’s scientific career and interests.

Kimberly Howard-Quijano, MD, MS, and Marta Kelava, MD, were awarded the inaugural Society of Cardiovascular Anesthesiologists Multi-Institutional Collaborative Clinical/Translational Research Grant for their project "The Effect of Continuous Low Tidal Volume Ventilation and Hyperoxia Avoidance during Cardiopulmonary Bypass.”

They were recognized for their abstract “Preclinical Evaluation of a Novel Glycinergic Analgesic for Treatment of Chronic Pain in Rodents.”