20 May Casey Receives Grant Funding from American Diabetes Association May 20, 2016 By The Fraternal Order of Eagles Diabetes Research Center 0 Congratulations to Darren Casey, PhD, assistant professor of physical therapy and rehabilitation science, for recently receiving the American Diabetes Association Innovative Clinical or Translational Science Award. For his proposal entitled - Nitrate supplementation and exercise tolerance in patients with Type 2 Diabetes. Dr. Casey received this award after a National Competition that selected a fraction of the most meritorious proposals. Exercise intolerance is a consistent finding in individuals with type 2 diabetes. Reduced exercise capacity is associated with increased cardiovascular related events and death. Two key determinants of exercise tolerance and capacity are 1) oxygen delivery to the metabolically active tissue (e.g. skeletal muscle) and 2) the utilization of oxygen within skeletal muscle, both of which are impaired in patients with type 2 diabetes. Nitric Oxide, is made by blood vessels and plays an important role in dilating blood vessels to maintain flow to tissues in the body. Many researchers have shown that blood vessels from patients with diabetes make less nitric oxide than healthy vessels. Since reduction in bioavailable nitric oxide has been implicated as a potential mechanism for impaired oxygen delivery and utilization in the muscles of diabetics, the novel studies outlined in his proposal will provide unique insight into the therapeutic potential of dietary nitrate supplementation for increasing bioavailable nitric oxide and subsequently improving skeletal muscle blood flow, mitochondrial function and exercise capacity in patients with type 2 diabetes. If these studies confirm that supplementation of dietary nitrates will improve blood vessel function and exercise capacity in diabetic subjects then future studies will determine if these improvements will translate to less cardiovascular complications and a longer life. The FOEDRC is proud of Dr. Casey’s achievement in our quest to prevent or treat many of the complications associated with diabetes. Related Articles American Diabetes Association Supports FOEDRC Researchers DRC Director's Report - January 2018 Three researchers from the FOEDRC received new grants from the American Diabetes Association for groundbreaking research. The ability of our members to receive these competitive awards is truly remarkable and underscores the quality and rigor of the research that is being conducted in the FOEDRC. There are few institutions that received multiple awards in this current round of ADA funding. The awards to Drs. Ling Yang, Rajan Sah and Adam Rauckhorst are summarized below. DRC Receives $2.02 Million Training Grant From National Institutes of Health I am pleased to share with you that Dr. E. Dale Abel, Director of the Fraternal Order of Eagles Diabetes Research Center (FOEDRC) and Chair of the Department of Internal Medicine, and Dr. Andrew (Andy) Norris, FOEDRC’s Associate Director, have just been awarded a five-year, $2.02M training grant from the National Institutes of Diabetes, Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the National Institutes of Health. The T32 grant will fund the Diabetes Research Training Program at the University of Iowa and will support up to six post-doctoral trainees or subspecialty fellows per year. The grant will support existing trainees or support the recruitment of outstanding new trainees to the University of Iowa. Abel Chosen To Lead One of Four American Heart Association Research Networks E. Dale Abel, MD, PhD, has been awarded a four-year $3.8M grant from the American Heart Association (AHA) to investigate mechanisms that increase the risk of cardiovascular disease in people with type 2 diabetes. Abel will oversee a Strategically Focused Research Network (SFRN) of three projects in partnership with other UI departments and the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Harvard Medical School. The team will examine the relationship between novel secreted molecules from liver, adipose tissue, and skeletal muscle that may directly or indirectly lead to damage of the heart and blood vessels in individuals with diabetes. DRC Researcher Sah Awarded Grant From ADA Rajan Sah, M.D., Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Internal Medicine Cardiology Division and member of the Fraternal Order of Eagles Diabetes Research Center was recently awarded a Research Grant from the American Diabetes Association (ADA). The project entitled: SWELL1 regulation of ß-cell excitability and insulin secretion will be supported by the $345,000 award over the next three years. Also, this leading edge experimentation was published in the January issue of Nature Communication. How Diabetes Harms The Heart Study in mice involving FOEDRC researchers, reveals heart-damaging pathway triggered by insulin, identifies possible drug targets to prevent or treat heart failure. Diabetes is hard on the heart. Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in people with diabetes, and risk for heart failure—where the heart can’t pump enough blood—is two to three times higher in men and up to five times higher in women with diabetes compared to people without diabetes. DRC Researchers Publish Major Breakthrough In Understanding How Diabetes Induces Eye Damage In the retina, diabetes damages nerves before it damages blood vessels. Diabetes is a major risk factor for severe vision loss and blindness. A condition known as retinal diabetic neuropathy causes visual impairment through the degeneration of small nerves (neurons) in light-sensitive tissue called the retina, which lines the back of the eye. Showing 0 Comment Comments are closed.