Center Participants And Their Research

center participants & their research

Research at the Center currently focuses on utilizing the plasticity of structural and functional components of the heart and central nervous system to seek novel means for identifying risk and to prevent and treat disease.

Dr. Michael Rosen, the Gustavus A. Pfeiffer Professor of Pharmacology, and Professor of Pediatrics, directs the Center for Molecular Therapeutics. Center membership includes (but is not limited to) the following scientists and their research groups:

Penelope Boyden, Ph.D., (Professor of Pharmacology) looks for fundamental alterations of ion channel function in the myocardium altered by disease processes that predispose to cardiac arrhythmias. Her work addresses a major public health problem, because about 25% of patients with myocardial infarction (200-250,000 individuals per year) experience lethal arrhythmias.

Steven Feinmark, Ph.D., (Senior Research Scientist in Pharmacology) studies mechanisms responsible for long-term potentiation in the central nervous system, a process essential to the occurrence of memory. He is investigating lipid regulatory molecules that determine plasticity in the CNS, including the processes of memory and forgetting. The research seeks to fulfill a compelling need to understand and treat dementias, including Alzheimer's Disease, and also provides a template for cardiovascular studies.

Robert Kass, Ph.D., (David A. Hosack Professor and Chairman of Pharmacology and Member, Center of Neurobiology and Behavior) examines the genetic transmission of ion channel abnormalities expressed as familial and/or drug-induced arrhythmias, to advance strategies for prevention and therapy. These studies not only are significant in the approach to lethal arrhythmias in children, but will have major impact in identifying patients who will be most susceptible to life-threatening arrhythmias induced by drugs or by myocardial infarction.

Andrew Marks, M.D., (Professor of Medicine and Pharmacology) studies molecular recognition of channels that regulate intracellular levels of calcium and are central determinants of both heart failure and sudden cardiac death. Discovering new means for their modulation will help develop novel approaches to prevention and therapy for myocardial infarction and cardiomyopathy, both major causes of sudden death.

Richard Robinson, Ph.D., (Professor of Pharmacology), seeks novel means for influencing heart rate by studying developmental changes in cardiac pacemaker currents and by collaborating in the cloning and expression of pacemaker channels. This research addresses the problem of failure of the normal cardiac pacemaker to beat properly or to deliver its signal to the rest of the heart. The goal of the research is to optimize pacemaker function in needy patients.

Michael Rosen, M.D., (Gustavus A. Pfeiffer Professor of Pharmacology and Professor of Pediatrics at Columbia, and Adjunct Professor of Physiology and Biophysics at SUNY Stony Brook) focuses on the determinants of the plasticity of cardiac electrical function and their relationship to memory. By studying early changes in signaling and electrophysiology, his group is developing novel approaches to predicting risk, as well as addressing the prevention and alteration of cardiac arrhythmias and contractile dysfunction. A second major goal of Dr. Rosen and his colleagues is to use gene and stem cell therapies to alter the course of cardiac arrhythmias, as well as to create biological pacemakers to provide sources of impulse initiation for diseased hearts.

Susan Steinberg, M.D., (Professor of Pharmacology) performs research on signal transduction, focusing on the caveolae in muscle membranes and the organization of receptor-effector coupling pathways within them. This work offers unique insights into the determinants of normal and abnormal rhythm and contraction and means whereby anomalies can be located and corrected. The importance of caveolin in limb girdle muscular dystrophy and in breast cancer extends the applicability of this research far beyond cardiovascular disease.

Judah Weinberger, M.D. and members of his laboratory focus on translating basic insights into therapies applicable to treatment of cardiovascular disease. They have pioneered the use of intravascular ionizing radiation (brachytherapy) to prevent restenosis after baloon angioplasty and stenting. In addition to the conceptual biological experiments they have engineered several workable systems for brachytherapy that are now in clinical trials. Their interest in local therapy of cardiac disease extends to local pharmacotherapy. They have developed slow-release microspheres containing various biologically active compounds, and are studying release kinetics, biological activity, systemic effects, and delivery modalities.

Andrew Wit, Ph.D., (Professor of Pharmacology) studies myocardial infarction and its effects on cardiac structure, electrophysiologic function and arrhythmias. His research on the remodeling of gap junctions and resultant changes in conduction has suggested novel methods of preventing or suppressing arrhythmias that occur as a result of infarction. This work impacts directly on the 200,000-250,000 patients per year who suffer lethal arrhythmias during myocardial infarction and who - if the arrhythmias could be prevented or treated - would continue to live productive lives.

Center Participants And Their Research | A Non-Traditional Center | Looking Forward Five Years | Supporting, Nurturing & Applying the Most Promising Ideas