The study entitled, “Cryotherapy for a Spectrum of Breast Cancer: US and CT-guidance,” was presented at the Society of Interventional Radiology’s 35th Annual Scientific Meeting in Tampa, Fla. It details how researchers successfully froze breast cancer in patients who refused surgery. The women also did not need surgery to ensure the tumors were destroyed.

“Minimally-invasive cryotherapy opens the door for a potential new treatment for breast cancer and needs to be further tested,” said Peter J. Littrup, M.D., vice chair for radiology research, director of interventional radiology at the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute and professor of radiology, urology and radiation oncology at Wayne State University's School of Medicine. “When used for local control and/or potential cure of breast cancer, it provided safe and effective breast conservation with minimal discomfort for a group of women who refused invasive surgery or had a local recurrence and needed additional management."

“This is the first reported study of successfully freezing breast cancer without having to undergo surgery afterward to prove that it was completely treated.”

In the 13-patient study, researchers used several needle-like cryoprobes that were evenly spaced and inserted through the skin to deliver extremely cold gas directly to the tumor to freeze it. This technique has been used for many years by surgeons in the operating room.

In the last few years, however, the needles have become small enough to be used by interventional radiologists through a small nick in the skin, without the need for an operation. The “ice ball” that is created around the needle grows in size and destroys the frozen tumor cells.

Biopsies were done at the margins of the cryotherapy site immediately after the procedure. Follow-up inspections at those cryotherapy sites showed no cancer present. No localized treatment recurrences were seen for up to five years in the study; no significant complications were noted; and women were pleased with the cosmetic outcomes, noted Dr. Littrup.

Major benefits of cryotherapy are its superb visualization of the ice treatment zone during the procedure, its low pain profile in an outpatient setting and its excellent healing with minimal scar, according to Dr. Littrup. Breast imaging has significantly advanced by accurate improvements in breast magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), allowing for excellent treatment planning of tumor size and extent within the breast, as well as showing zones of destruction thoroughly covering the tumor after cryotherapy.

This potential treatment method holds widespread promise for the nearly 200,000 women who are diagnosed with breast cancer annually in the United States. For these women, as well as the thousands of men diagnosed each year, breast cancer treatments can be highly effective but often require invasive treatment options such as surgery and chemotherapy.

Surgery offers the best chance for a cure. Until long-term data is available, interventional treatments -- such as cryotherapy, thermal ablation and laser therapy -- are reserved for women who cannot have -- or have refused surgery.

Cryotechnology promises to be more MR-compatible, Dr. Littrup said, and would also allow accurate targeting of more difficult-to-see breast tumors. More importantly, larger studies in multiple centers needs to be done, following these basic cryobiology principles of sufficient lethal temperatures generated by multiple cryoprobes spaced evenly throughout a breast cancer region.

“With recent developments of powerful new cryotechnology, multiple directions for breast cryotherapy can be pursued, including translating the current, somewhat challenging, procedure done with ultrasound and/or CT guidance to a more consistent and reproducible MR-guided approach,” said Dr. Littrup.

The study was authored by Dr. Littrup, M.D.; Monica D’Agostini, an undergraduate student who volunteered with the Department of Radiology at Karmanos Cancer Institute; Barbara Adam, cryotherapy staff nurse at Karmanos Cancer Institute; and David Bouwman, M.D., emeritus director of Karmanos’ Alexander J. Walt Breast Center and professor of surgery at Wayne State University's School of Medicine; along with Bassel Jallad, M.D., and Priti Chandiwala-Mody, D.O., residents in Wayne State University's School of Medicine.

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For further information, contact Julie O’Connor, director of Research Communications, Wayne State University, at 313-577-8845 or via email at ag2712@wayne.edu and Patricia Ellis, Media Relations Manager, Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, at 313-576-8629 or via email at ellisp@karmanos.org.

Wayne State University WSU is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit www.research.wayne.edu.

Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute Located in mid-town Detroit, Michigan, the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute is one of 40 National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer centers in the United States. Caring for nearly 6,000 new patients annually on a budget of $216 million, conducting more than 700 cancer-specific scientific investigation programs and clinical trials, Karmanos is among the nation’s best cancer centers. Through the commitment of 1,000 staff, including nearly 300 physicians and researchers on faculty at the Wayne State University School of Medicine, and supported by thousands of volunteer and financial donors, Karmanos strives to prevent, detect and eradicate all forms of cancer. Its long-term partnership with the WSU School of Medicine enhances the collaboration of critical research and academics related to cancer care. Karmanos is southeastern Michigan’s most preferred hospital for cancer care according to annual surveys conducted by the National Research Corporation. For more information call 1-800-KARMANOS or go to www.karmanos.org.

The two institutions are developing E3 as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) with a $5 million ARRA grant funded by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) that aims to provide educational programs in support of President Barack Obama’s goal of having one million plug-in hybrid electric vehicles on the road by 2015.

“The objective of this program is to prepare our current and future workforce with the education and skills necessary for the advancement and maintenance of electric drive vehicles,” said Hilary Ratner, vice president for research at Wayne State University and chair of the advisory committee. “It is our intent to ensure we have the most innovative curriculum that can meet the needs of the automotive industry as energy policy evolves over the next few years. This is a key area of growth in the automotive area, and this partnership with Macomb Community College and NextEnergy will provide the next generation of automotive workers with critical skills necessary for engineers and technicians to advance and support electric drive vehicles.”

The program will develop and implement a comprehensive set of advanced educational programs in electric drive vehicles including a master’s degree in electric drive vehicle engineering; a bachelor’s degree in electric transportation technology; an associate degree in automotive technology and electronic engineering technology; and an undergraduate concentration and graduate certificate program in electric drive vehicle engineering.

In addition, the program will host national workshops; education for the general public, K-12 teachers and first responders; and will create a Web site to serve as a main portal of the most comprehensive and up-to-date information in electric drive vehicle technology and educational programs in the nation.

The newly formed electric drive vehicle engineering advisory board includes:
• Ray Boeman, director, Advanced Transportation Systems Program and NTRC User Facility, Oakridge National Laboratory
• Keith Cooley, CEO, NextEnergy
• Hansen Clarke, state senator (D-1)
• Michael Fetcenko, vice president, Ovonic Materials
• Ricardo Espinosa, vice president of engineering, Azure Dynamics, Inc.
• Nancy Gioia, vice president of global electrification, Ford Motor Company
• David Gorsich, chief scientist, U.S. Army Tank Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center
• James Jacobs, president, Macomb Community College
• Steven Kurmas, president and COO, DTE Energy
• Gregory Main, president and CEO, Michigan Economic Development Corp
• Prabhakar Patil, president and CEO, Compact Power, Inc.
• Bob Purcell, Purcell & Associates, LLC
• Hilary Ratner (Chair),vice president for research, Wayne State University

For more information about E3, visit www.eng.wayne.edu/eve.

Media Contact: Cheryl Yurkovich, (313) 577-2150 or cyurkovich@wayne.edu
or Julie O’Connor, (313) 577-8845 or julie.oconnor@wayne.edu

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit www.research.wayne.edu.

Macomb Community College is one of the nation’s leading community colleges, providing learning experiences to more than 59,000 students annually. Macomb nationally ranks in the top two percent in the number of associate degrees awarded and as the largest grantor of associate degrees in Michigan. The college’s comprehensive educational programming includes pre-collegiate experiences, university transfer and career preparation programs, bachelor degree completion and graduate degree programs, workforce training, professional education and certification, and continuing education and enrichment opportunities. For more information about Macomb Community College, visit www.macomb.edu.

Kim, an experimental particle physicist whose research focuses on understanding the origin of mass for fundamental particles, is professor of physics at the University of Chicago and the Enrico Fermi Institute. She has been the deputy director of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory since July 2006.

The lecture will be held in WSU’s Spencer M. Partrich Law School Auditorium. Refreshments will be served at 3 p.m.; the lecture will follow at 4 p.m. The lecture is free and open to the public; registration is required. Reserve a seat by visiting http://events.wayne.edu/rsvp/2010-vaden-w-miles-memorial-lecturer/.

The profound discovery by Einstein a century ago that particles can be made from energy and disappear back into energy inspires the experiments that provide knowledge of the smallest building blocks of matter. The experiments, performed at enormous energy and intensity frontier accelerators, have led to a consistent theory of the origins of our world up to a certain point. However, at an energy scale not far above what can be attained at existing accelerators, this picture is predicted to break down. Moreover, the theory of the very small is intimately connected to cosmology -- the ultimate cause and structure of our universe. Cosmological observations point to the need for a new theory in this energy range.

Kim’s lecture will trace the path from where we are to what we need to do to take the next step towards understanding the nature of space and time. The discovery of new particles or new laws at energy and intensity frontier accelerators will open windows on this world.

For additional information, contact Zhixian Zhou at zxzhou@wayne.edu.

Media contact:  Julie O'Connor, julie.oconnor@wayne.edu or (313) 577-8845.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

The revelation is just one of several findings in the study by a team of WSU political science faculty led by Marjorie Sarbaugh-Thompson, professor of political science in WSU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, which was published in the Feb. 2010 edition of the Legislative Studies Quarterly. The study showed the six-year term limit for state representatives and eight-year term limit for state senators have largely failed to fulfill promises made to Michigan citizens who voted the 1992 proposal into effect.

“Many Michigan citizens do not realize that our term limits are among the shortest in the nation, or that only 15 states have them at all,” Sarbaugh-Thompson said. “These term limits were sold to Michigan voters on the notion that they would sever close ties with lobbyists and cause legislators to be more independent,” Sarbaugh-Thompson said. “In reality, we found them to have the opposite impact.”

Research was conducted through four different rounds of interviews with Michigan legislators between 1998 and 2004. In addition to Dr. Sarbaugh-Thompson, the research team included WSU political science faculty members Charles Elder, Ph.D., John Strate, Ph.D., Richard Elling, Ph.D. and Lyke Thompson, Ph.D., director of WSU’s Center for Urban Studies, as well as Kelly LeRoux, Ph.D., assistant professor at the University of Kansas. Based on more than 400 interviews, the team assessed who or what influenced legislators’ policy-making decisions as well as how conflicts within their committees and between party members are resolved. Campaign finance reports were also reviewed to investigate whether representatives’ financial relationships with special interest groups had changed from before and after term limits were introduced.

The results of the research show that lobbyists’ influence over legislators was not only maintained after term limits were in effect, but may have increased. For instance, special interests’ importance as a source of “information and guidance” on a bill about school choice increased after term limits began. Lobbyists were also cited among the top three actors that determined whether a bill reached the floor of the chamber after term limits were in effect.

The study also found that term limits greatly diminished the amount of time and effort legislators spend monitoring state-run agencies, despite the fact they were supposed to increase legislators’ independence from bureaucratic influence. "Even when the governor and the legislators are of the same party, these checks are important,” Sarbaugh-Thompson said. “But this research shows that many legislators elected after term limits don’t even realize this is part of their job.”

Sarbaugh-Thompson believes the problem stems from the limited time that legislators have to understand their jobs, coupled with a lack of veteran legislators to mentor and train incoming representatives. One possible solution to the problem would be to extend term limits for Michigan legislators. “By extending term limits, freshmen representatives would have experienced legislators to mentor them, committee chairs and party leaders would have enough time to develop skills and relationships, while still preventing them from serving for decades.
“In addition, a longer term means that rather than campaigning for their next position, legislators would have a longer time to focus on their current position of leading the state effectively.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

The goal is to find ways to transform the regional, state, national and, ultimately, global transportation industries.

Transforming Transportation: Economies & Communities (TTEC) is a new program to promote multidisciplinary, multi-institutional research that supports industry, community and government policymaking and planning. The three URC institutions---Michigan State University, the University of Michigan and Wayne State University---are each holding meetings with their campus researchers to prepare for an inaugural transportation summit to be held in Detroit in October of this year.

“The intent of the initiative is to build research teams composed of university, community, business and government partners in an effort to better understand transport of people and products in ways that also stimulate innovative approaches to economic development,” said Hiram Fitzgerald, associate provost for university outreach and engagement at MSU.

“Michigan is an iconic hub of transportation and innovation, and is situated geographically near the center of the United States and Canada. Our technological assets and strategic geographical position can be combined with the intellectual strengths of Michigan's three great research universities to help make Michigan a major player in fulfilling the world's transportation needs in the future."

While research into transportation has been a long-term interest of all three institutions, this is an opportunity to leverage the collective resources and create a comprehensive program. The rapid change in the transportation environment has profoundly affected the state and regional economy and has created widespread community disruption.

Recent U-M estimates, for example, indicate that between mid-2000 and 2009, the state is expected to have lost almost a million jobs or one-fifth of its workforce with much of that loss related to transportation fields.

Peter Sweatman, director of U-M’s Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI), said the group is taking a wide-ranging approach to the problem of transportation.

“Transportation is a complex system that extends beyond cars, although cars are certainly a critical part of the mix,” Sweatman said. “There are social, economic, policy and security issues and, of course, sustainability and climate change must be part of any effort to transform the system. This is not just a question of technology.”

Susan Zielinski, managing director of UMTRI’s Sustainable Mobility & Accessibility Research & Transformation (SMART) initiative added, “Sitting at the historic epicenter of transportation innovation, Michigan is right now strategically placed to reclaim that role with the benefit of this consortium - to innovate and supply the kind of sophisticated, multi-faceted solutions, as well as the new business, financial, and policy models needed to support and transform economies and communities – not only in Michigan but globally.”

Allen Batteau, an anthropologist who heads Wayne State’s Institute for Information Technology and Culture, explained that the goal of the group is to be forward thinking and seek opportunities for positive change. He noted that while the challenges faced by the auto industry have created severe disruption and economic hardship, they also have created opportunities.

“This is a once in a generation opportunity to rethink fundamental assumptions,” Batteau said. “We can’t let this opportunity pass us by and the research universities have an obligation to help point the way.”

The University Research Corridor presidents aligned in November 2006 to improve understanding of the vital role the three universities play in revitalizing the state’s economy. The collaborative effort is designed to disseminate useful information for key stakeholders, including the business community, researchers and students, policymakers and other partners.

In doing so, the universities hope to enhance their collaborative efforts, accelerate technology transfer and development and demonstrate the advantages of doing business in Michigan.

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The URC, an alliance of Michigan State University, the University of Michigan and Wayne State University, was founded to leverage the power of Michigan’s research universities to transform, strengthen and diversify the state’s economy. A recent study found that the three universities have a combined impact on the state’s economy of $14.5 billion. To learn more, visit http://urcmich.org.

This method is based on the use of dendrimers (a tree-like nanoscale polymer) for sensitive capture of ultra-low concentrations of inflammatory markers in the amniotic fluid. This led to a seven-fold improvement in the sensitivity over traditional assays used for the detection of intra-amniotic infection (IAI) and inflammation. These infections can be very serious, often leading to premature birth, which accounts for 75% of perinatal mortality and 50% of perinatal morbidity, and is a leading cause of cerebral palsy.

To prevent fetal damage or death, the team of researchers, led by Rangaramanujam Kannan, Ph.D., professor of chemical engineering in the College of Engineering, is developing highly sensitive diagnostic methods for the early detection of elevated concentrations of cytokines in amniotic fluid that can predict intra-amniotic infection/inflammation. This approach has been validated for important markers such as Interleukin-6 (IL-6) and IL-13, whose elevated levels play a key role in chorioamnionitis (maternal bacterial infection leading to inflammation of the fetal membranes).

“The work is an example of the synergy that can be created when talented scientists from different disciplines work together. In this case, it was the WSU nanotechnology group and the physicians taking care of pregnant women and their unborn babies,” said Dr. Roberto Romero, chief of the Perinatology Research Branch of the NIH.

“Diagnostic methods and treatments for pregnancy complications is an underdeveloped area in medicine,” said Kannan. “Product liability and the complexities of pregnancy have represented an important barrier to progress. We believe that this joint effort will lead to the early identification and successful treatment of infections in pregnant women. Moreover, in utero treatment may help to prevent fetal brain injury and cerebral palsy. Our recent paper in Advanced Functional Materials is a key step in that direction. This is part of a large translational nanotechnology research effort within the PRB.”

To view the recent paper, visit http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/123227939/abstract. Advanced Functional Materials is the leading full-paper materials science journal, with a 2008 ISI Impact Factor of 6.808.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

The Perinatology Research Branch is one of only a few research branches of the National Institutes of Health located outside of Bethesda, MD. The PRB is a10-year contract that averages nearly $15 million per year. The PRB has made it possible for Wayne State to provide health care for more than 15,000 pregnant women since 2002. The PRB provides knowledge-based employment for more than 120 people and has a significant economic impact annually in southeastern Michigan. For more information about the PRB, visit http://www.med.wayne.edu/prb/.

The IMSE program guides and supports students through the completion of a college degree through tutoring, supplemental education support and part-time IT positions at leading Detroit-area companies. “The demand for IT professionals is growing rapidly, yet minorities and women are dramatically unrepresented in the field,” said Monica Brockmeyer, Ph.D., associate professor of computer science in WSU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Farmington Hills, Mich., resident and director of the IMSE program at WSU. “Our goal is to spark the interest of under-represented groups and provide the tools for staying persistent in the pursuit of a degree.”

The program’s students are graduates of Focus: HOPE’s IT certificate program, which provides technical training in computing skills. When they enter the IMSE program, they participate in the IMSE Bridge, a college preparation course that equips students that have had inadequate or fragmented secondary educations with competitive, college-entry skills, before coming to Wayne State University. The rest of the IMSE program continues Focus: HOPE’s hands-on, group-oriented approach to education, with an emphasis on real-world applications of information technology.

The IMSE program also works to foster a “growth mindset,” – the understanding that intelligence is not a fixed attribute, but one that grows with work and effort, like a muscle. This is done through its rigorous approach to education by tutors, mentors and
instructors who have similar backgrounds and are successful in the IT fields.

“There comes a point for every student where their studies become difficult,” Brockmeyer said. For underrepresented students it can be worse, because they may self-consciously look around and say, ‘There aren’t too many people here like me, so maybe I’m not meant to do this.’

“We try to teach the students that it’s normal to have a hard time – it doesn’t mean anything is wrong with you. This knowledge is especially effective when it comes from teachers that double as role models for students,” Brockmeyer said.

As the program moves through its fourth year, Brockmeyer is joined by Rusty McIntyre, Ph.D., assistant professor of psychology in WSU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, to conduct research on countering stereotypes with role models. Brockmeyer said the addition of this research will help expand on IMSE’s success. “The computer science program at Wayne State is a great laboratory for exploring techniques that will increase student’s persistence in achieving a career in computing and IT fields. We’re looking forward to refining our approach so the program will become even more effective.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Focus: HOPE, a nationally renowned civil and human rights organization founded in 1968, provides a range of programs and services in its effort to overcome racism, poverty and injustice. More than 8,000 talented men and women have graduated from its workforce development programs. Its food program provides nutritionally-balanced food to 41,000 seniors, mothers and children each month and its new HOPE Village Initiative coordinates a range of services designed to help children from the neighborhoods surrounding Focus: HOPE achieve to their full potential. Through Focus: HOPE, thousands of individuals – especially women and minorities – have become financially independent. For more information about Focus: HOPE, visit http://www.focushope.edu

 
DETROIT—On February 19, 2010, two Wayne State University faculty will visit the Pentagon to receive an international award from Alan R. Shaffer, Principal Deputy Director of Defense Research and Engineering for the Department of Defense.

The Technical Cooperation Program (TTCP), a long-standing international organization concerned with collaboration on defense science and technology matters including national security and defense, will honor 53 scientists and engineers including Lawrence (Skip) Favro, professor emeritus of physics in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and Xiaoyan Han, professor of electrical and computer engineering in the College of Engineering at Wayne State University. Favro and Han are the only university professors to be honored by TTCP.

Favro and Han are being honored for their sonic thermography technology used for inspecting large areas and complex shapes in a short amount of time to reveal fatigue cracks. This technology can find and quantify defects in metals and composite materials, and is also used for process control applications in automotive and aerospace industries.

“We are pleased and honored to have two of our faculty receive this prestigious award,” said Hilary Ratner, vice president for research at WSU. “Drs. Favro and Han have made significant advances in sonic thermography that can detect closed hairline cracks in an economically and environmentally friendly way. The technique is useful in aircraft inspections, and new analytical tools and techniques that they are developing show great promise.”

Member countries of the TTCP include Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States. TTCP acquaints and supplements participating nations with each other's defense research and development (R&D) programs so that each may be adjusted and planned in cognizance of the efforts of the other nations. This ultimately provides them shared knowledge, resources and the best technical information available to advise their governments and military forces on all matters related to defense R&D.
 

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

The grant is one of 22 Recovery Act Funds totaling approximately $18.3 million awarded to support S.T.E.M. education. The grants are part of the National Institutes of Health’s national effort to attract young people to biomedical and behavioral science careers and to improve science literacy in adults and children. WSU is one of only two Michigan universities to receive this type of funding.

The grant will be used for a professional development summer institute for current Detroit Public Schools in-service high school teachers and supplements to curriculum for students in WSU’s College of Education. Material will consist of historical, contemporary and emerging issues in environmental health, including genetic code, genetic engineering, DNA mutations and current trends and applications of biotechnology.

The purpose of the course is to stimulate job creation and sustainability by raising teacher quality and student competency in S.T.E.M. areas in the adversely economically impacted Detroit Public Schools. It is also anticipated that the skills obtained by the pre-service teachers will assist them in securing a position in a prospective school district after graduation.

“By improving the understanding of science concepts and skills in current and future teachers, we will enhance the competitive edge and marketability of these teachers and their students,” Dereski said. “In Detroit’s dire economy and failing school system, this training could not be more valuable.”

The program’s environmental health focus is particularly relevant to Detroit, where there is much concern surrounding the contamination of hazardous substances such as lead. The curriculum will include many of the known health implications of living among environmental contaminants.

“We’re really hoping to see a lot of environmental health research translated into positive public health outcomes,” Dereski said. “In that way, this program also provides the public service of empowering residents of Detroit with knowledge that could lead to bringing positive change to their city.”

Once the grant is complete, support for teachers will continue through a supplemental Web site that will provide important development resources as well as a forum for teacher dialogue. “It is extremely important that teachers have access to resources and to each other as they work on problem solving and incorporating these important facets into curriculum,” Dereski said. “Our hope is that the site will facilitate continued improvement to Detroit Public Schools and job creation and retention in the Detroit area long after the grant’s two years are complete.”
 

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Melissa Runge-Morris, M.D., professor and acting director of the Institute of Environmental Health Sciences at Wayne State University and a resident of Detroit, Mich., received $418,000 from the National Institutes of Health. Her research group is investigating the effect of PCBs accumulated in breast tissue, beginning in the very early stages of development.

“We’re trying to understand if normal levels of PCBs that one might be exposed to in the environment accelerate breast cancer progression,” Runge-Morris said.

PCBs are a class of chemical compound that for many years was used in hundreds of industrial and commercial applications including electrical, heat transfer, and hydraulic processes. Although no longer commercially produced in the U.S., PCBs may be present in products and materials produced before their 1979 ban. PCBs do not readily break down, tending instead to persist in the environment, cycling among air, water and soil for long periods of time. They are not easily detoxified from the human body, instead accumulating and persisting in fatty tissue over extended periods of time. Research has provided conclusive data that PCBs cause cancer in animals, with studies in humans supporting their potential carcinogenicity.

Runge-Morris will study the effects of PCBs in normal human breast epithelial cells and in those that are more progressed toward cancer. She will use cell culture techniques and will transplant or “xenograft” cells into immunodeficient mice. Her studies are designed to determine whether PCBs activate key estrogen-responsive or reactive oxygen pathways implicated in breast carcinogenesis.
The cell culture and xenograft model for human breast cancer progression that is used by Runge-Morris’ research team was developed by WSU investigators at the former Michigan Cancer Foundation. Runge-Morris said one of the advantages of this model is that it facilitates the exploration of the earliest stages of breast cancer development. “Many of the breast cancer cell lines that are currently studied represent more advanced stages of cancer,” she said. “Our model, on the other hand, uses human breast epithelial cells that are practically normal to determine if exposure to PCBs or other environmental contaminants tips the balance toward cancer progression. It also takes advantage of the limited mouse lifespan, allowing us to determine if cancer develops at an accelerated rate.”

Runge-Morris received a second stimulus grant for $357,461 to investigate the function of a liver enzyme that plays a central role in lipid metabolism. Disturbances in lipid metabolism set the stage for the emergence of metabolic diseases such as heart disease, liver dysfunction and insulin resistant type II diabetes.

The enzyme hydroxysteroid sulfotransferase, or SULT2A1, is known to metabolize hormones and detoxify drugs, chemicals in the environment and carcinogens. Recent studies, however, suggest that SULT2A1 is also capable of metabolizing oxysterol intermediates of cholesterol metabolism.

Runge-Morris’ lab uses primary cultured human hepatocytes and molecular biology approaches to characterize the enzyme’s integrated role in a vast lipid metabolism network. “We want to understand exactly what controls the gene that encodes SULT2A1 because it may explain the diversity of responses that characterize drug, chemical, hormone and cholesterol metabolism in humans.”

Results of the study will shed new light on diseases that occur as a function of disordered lipid metabolism. “Not everyone who is obese, for example, develops type II diabetes,” Runge-Morris said. “We suspect this could be due to critical inter-individual differences in lipid metabolism. A better understanding of the molecular events that regulate the major players in lipid metabolism like SULT2A1 will provide us with the tools to recognize and prevent the development of serious metabolic diseases in humans.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, the state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Schizophrenia is one of the most debilitating mental illnesses in the world. Research suggests the illness is related to disordered brain neurochemistry and function. Thus, if the neurochemical and functional bases of the illness can be clearly understood, treatment strategies can be better tuned to help improve outcome and function.

Dr. Vaibhav A. Diwadkar, assistant professor of psychiatry and co-director of the Division of Brain Research and Imaging Neuroscience at WSU and resident of Bloomfield Township, and his collaborators will study the impact on schizophrenia of disordered neurochemistry and function in two key regions of the brain, the hippocampus and the prefrontal cortex. These regions are central to how the brain learns, and neurotransmitters that are essential to learning are also ones that do not function appropriately in the schizophrenia brain.

To study these questions in vivo, Diwadkar and his colleagues will use a combination of high-resolution functional magnetic resonance imaging to study brain function, and magnetic resonance spectroscopy to study brain neurochemistry in a group of stable schizophrenia patients and healthy controls. “The convergent application of these complementary imaging techniques is expected to greatly enhance our understanding of the role of these important brain regions in the expression of schizophrenia,” said Diwadkar.

NARSAD is the largest supporter of mental health research (outside of the National Institute of Mental Health) and is one of the most competitive funding agencies in the world. The foundation has a reputation for supporting cutting-edge research. This is Diwadkar’s second Young Investigator award from NARSAD. “This grant will allow me to facilitate the establishment of a larger research program that uses multiple imaging methods to better understand the bases of, and better inform treatment strategies for, mental illness,” said Diwadkar.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, the state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

For more information, contact Julie O'Connor at ag2712@wayne.edu or Phil Van Hulle at pvanhulle@med.wayne.edu.

“The primary aim is to track at what age and where in the brain developmental differences start to occur in ADHD compared to the developmental course of healthy individuals,” said Jeffrey Stanley, Ph.D., associate professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Neurosciences.

The NIMH approved a $2.7 million grant for the research, which will involve brain imaging and other forms of testing.

According to the NIMH, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder is one of the most common childhood illnesses. The symptoms include difficulty staying focused and paying attention, difficulty controlling behavior and hyperactivity. Current treatment includes drug therapy and psychotherapy, but there is no cure.

“The cause and the progression of this illness is poorly understood biochemically, anatomically and functionally,” Stanley said. “The goal of this study is to map out the developmental course of ADHD using neuroimaging biomarkers and to identify at what age and where in the brain changes are occurring in ADHD that deviate from the normal development course of healthy children. Certain brain areas or networks mature earlier than others, and we anticipate seeing neuroimaging alterations occurring in later maturing areas such as the prefrontal cortex that were potentially influenced by maldeveloped earlier brain areas.”

Stanley said ADHD affects 3 percent to 9 percent of children, and accounts for 30 percent to 40 percent of child referrals to mental health services. The condition persists into adulthood in as many as 60 percent of cases, affecting 4 percent of adults.

Medical researchers don’t yet know at what age brain networks change in children with ADHD, or how those early impaired networks influence other networks within the brain. Early identification of affected networks and charting changes, Stanley said, is critical for researchers to gain a greater understanding of the development and progression of the condition, and in developing more effective therapies.

Stanley and his research team in the Brain Research and Imaging Neuroscience Division will conduct a five-year neuroimaging study of children and teens with and without ADHD. Each group will consist of 40 children ages 6 to 14. The study patients will undergo a comprehensive battery of tests, including behavioral and cognitive tests, as well as magnetic resonance imaging of the brain, functional magnetic resonance imaging and in vivo spectroscopy, which can measure biochemical information from brain tissue without an invasive biopsy. Assessments of each child will be taken three times during the study to chart developmental changes.

All neuroimaging will take place at the WSU MR Research Facility in Harper University Hospital.

“The early identification of impaired networks and charting temporally impaired networks in ADHD is critical in gaining a greater understanding of the development and progression of ADHD,” Stanley said. “This will result in developing better targeted and age-appropriate cognitive and behavioral therapy for ADHD.”

Stanley also is co-director of the Brain Research and Imaging Neuroscience Division of the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Neurosciences and is program director and graduate officer of the Translational Neuroscience Program.

“ADHD can have a severe impact on a person’s life,” said Hilary Ratner, vice president for research at Wayne State University. “Education, relationships and even careers can be interfered with by ADHD symptoms. Dr. Stanley’s research may offer a clearer picture of the cause and progression of ADHD, and potentially lead to new therapies that will improve the lives of those with ADHD.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, the state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

For more information, contact Julie O'Connor at julie.oconnor@wayne.edu or Phil Van Hulle at pvanhulle@med.wayne.edu.

Detroit - Only about half of Americans diagnosed with major depression in a given year receive treatment for it and even fewer – about one-fifth – receive treatment consistent with current practice guidelines, according to data from national surveys supported by the National Institute of Mental Health of the National Institutes of Health. Among the groups surveyed, African- Americans and Mexican-Americans had the lowest rates of depression care, and all groups reported higher use of psychotherapy versus medication treatment.

Major depressive disorders (MDD) is the main cause of disability in the United States, and it is projected that over the next 20 years MDD will be the second leading cause of disability around the globe.

A team of researchers from Wayne State University, the University of Michigan, the University of California, Los Angeles and Harvard University, have published a paper in the January 2010 edition of the Archives of General Psychiatry that gives a detailed picture of the care received for major depression among different ethnic/racial groups and factors that contribute to disparities. The paper reports that too few Americans with recent major depressive disorders receive adequate depression care, and most receive no care at all.

African-Americans and Mexican-Americans, in particular, may be facing greater barriers to mental health care. “Contrary to our expectations that most Americans with depression would be using antidepressant drugs, we actually found higher psychotherapy use, especially among ethnic and racial minorities,” said Hector González, professor, Institute of Gerontology and Family Medicine and Public Health Sciences Department at Wayne State University.

Mexican-Americans make up more than two-thirds of Latinos in the U.S. “We found in our study that there are really distinctive difference in mental healthcare use between Mexican-Americans and other Latino subgroups that have not been previously reported,” said González. The authors note that Latinos will make up one-third of the U.S. population by mid-century; the study findings suggest that Mexican-Americans should be a focus of efforts to reduce health disparities to ensure the nation’s health in coming decades.

The authors provided evidence of well-defined disparities in depression care that mostly affected African-Americans and Mexican-Americans. “The problem with most previous research we have seen is that ethnic groups, particularly Latinos, are inappropriately lumped together rather than examining important ethnic subgroups,” said González. “I believe our study sets a new standard for understanding healthcare access disparities.”

All groups were more likely to have received psychotherapy than pharmacotherapy. Caribbean blacks and African-Americans were particularly unlikely to receive pharmacotherapy consistent with APA guidelines; enabling factors such as education, health insurance, and income did not explain the lower rates of medication use. The authors note possible reasons for this, including research indicating that perceived discrimination can shape health care seeking. They speculate that the non-immigrant status of Puerto Ricans—and with that, greater predominance of English language use within this group—may be factors in their relatively high rates of health care use.

Findings from this study will inform future research on adherence to various depression therapies, and the factors that shape differences in care among racial/ethnic groups. “Future studies,” said the authors, “should explore the extent to which patients’ subjective experiences of racial bias may affect their access and utilization of mental healthcare.”

The other researchers participating in this study are William Vega of UCLA’s Department of Family Medicine, David Williams of Harvard School of Public Health, Wassim Tarraf of WSU’s Institute of Gerontology and Department of Family Medicine, and Brady West and Harold Neighbors of the University of Michigan’s Center for Statistical Consultation and Research and Institute of Social Research, respectively.

For further information about this study, please visit http://research.wayne.edu/communications/forms/gonzalez_depression_care_12-15-09_-_journal_synopsis.doc. To view the full paper, “Depression Care in the United States: Too Little for Too Few” see the January 2010 edition of Archives of General Psychiatry 2010;67[1]:37-46, available pre-embargo to the media at www.jamamedia.org.

For media inquiries, contact Julie O'Connor, director of research communications at Wayne State University via phone 313-577-8845 or 734-748-4207 (cell), or email at julie.oconnor@wayne.edu.

Editor’s Note: This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Mental Health and the National Institute on Aging. Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, financial disclosures, funding and support, etc.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.
 

In addition, a Sponsored Program Roles and Responsibilities Matrix that identifies the major steps in the life cycle of an award - from proposal to closeout - has been developed. This matrix assigns "primary responsibility for each step to the principal investigator, department, college/school or SPA. The matrix provides descriptions of the various sponsored program activities and addresses the allocation of responsibilities. To view the Sponsored Program Roles and Responsibilities Matrix, please visit here.

Arrayit Diagnostics, Inc., a majority-owned subsidiary of Arrayit Corporation (OTCBB:ARYC), today announced that it has signed an exclusive License Agreement with Wayne State University to key intellectual property covering discoveries of biomarkers of ovarian cancer. The agreement with Wayne State University grants Arrayit exclusive worldwide rights to develop and commercialize a novel microarray-based diagnostic test using biomarkers developed by Professors Michael Tainsky and Judith Abrams of the School of Medicine and Karmanos Cancer Institute, Professor Sorin Draghici of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and Madhumita Chatterjee, senior research scientist in the School of Medicine. The test aims to effectively screen for early stage ovarian cancer in women who are not yet symptomatic.

According to the National Cancer Institute, it is estimated that 21,550 women will be diagnosed with and 14,600 women will die of cancer of the ovary in 2009 – making it the fourth leading cause of death in women in the United States. Moreover, based on rates from 2004-2006, 1.4% of women born today will be diagnosed with ovarian cancer at some point during their lifetime. The disease presents with largely nonspecific symptoms during the initial stages of cancer progression, however there is currently no adequate screening or diagnostic test for early stage detection. As a result, most ovarian cancers are diagnosed only when later stage symptoms manifest and the disease has metastasized to other parts of the body. The five-year survival rate for late stage diagnosis is less than 20%, which compares to an approximate 90% survival rate if the disease is identified at the earliest stages.

John Howell, chairman, president and CEO of Arrayit Diagnostics, noted, “Distinguished among ‘America’s Best Colleges’ by US News and World Report and the National Science Foundation research rankings, Wayne State University is globally recognized for its groundbreaking work in genomic and proteomic research. Arrayit Corporation will use these biomarkers to create a microarray test that will allow the identification of ovarian cancer in patients before any symptoms occur. We are very proud to be teaming with Wayne State University to bring this potentially life-saving screening tool to market.”

Arrayit Diagnostics plans to file a premarket approval application for its proprietary Pre-symptomatic Ovarian Cancer Diagnostic Test with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in the near future. Upon receiving marketing approval, Arrayit Diagnostics will actively market and distribute the test kit worldwide.

Based on data derived from the American Cancer Society and the current frequency of Pap smear tests – and the assumption that a test for ovarian cancer would be conducted in concert with the Pap smear--Arrayit Diagnostics estimates that the present market for an early stage ovarian cancer diagnostic test could exceed 66 million tests each year in the U.S. alone. When adding estimates for Western Europe and Japan, that number could nearly triple to 175 million tests annually.

About Arrayit Corporation
Arrayit Corporation, headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, leads and empowers the genetic, research, pharmaceutical and diagnostic communities through the discovery, development and manufacture of proprietary life science technologies and consumables for disease prevention, treatment and cure. It now offers over 650 products to a customer base of more than 10,000 laboratories worldwide, including almost every major university, pharmaceutical and biotechnology company, major agricultural and chemical companies, government agencies, national research foundations and many private sector enterprises. Please visit www.arrayit.com for more information.

About Arrayit Diagnostics, Inc.
Houston-based Arrayit Diagnostics, Inc., a majority-owned subsidiary of Arrayit Corporation, is actively engaged in developing and commercializing a series of proprietary microarray-based diagnostic tests that provide for early detection of cancers, neurodegenerative diseases and other chronic and severe disease states.

About Wayne State University
Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

About Karmanos Cancer Institute
Located in mid-town Detroit, Michigan, the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute is one of 40 National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer centers in the United States. Caring for nearly 6,000 new patients annually on a budget of $216 million, conducting more than 700 cancer-specific scientific investigation programs and clinical trials, Karmanos is among the nation’s best cancer centers. Through the commitment of 1,000 staff, including nearly 300 physicians and researchers on faculty at the Wayne State University School of Medicine, and supported by thousands of volunteer and financial donors, Karmanos strives to prevent, detect and eradicate all forms of cancer. Its long-term partnership with the WSU School of Medicine enhances the collaboration of critical research and academics related to cancer care. Karmanos is southeastern Michigan’s most preferred hospital for cancer care according to annual surveys conducted by the National Research Corporation. For more information call 1-800-KARMANOS or visit www.karmanos.org.

Safe Harbor Statement
Except for historical information contained herein, statements made in this release that constitute forward-looking statements are based on currently available information, involve certain risks and uncertainties and the Company assumes no responsibility to update any such forward-looking statement. The following factors, among others, may cause actual results to differ materially from the results suggested in the forward-looking statements. Risks that may result from changes in the Company's business operations; our ability to keep pace with technological advances; significant competition in the biomedical business; our relationships with key suppliers and customers; quality and consumer acceptance of newly introduced products; market volatility; non-availability of product; excess inventory; price and product competition; new product introductions, the outcome of our legal disputes; the possibility that the review of our prior filings by the SEC may result in changes to our financial statements; and the possibility that stockholders or regulatory authorities may initiate proceedings against Arrayit and/or our officers and directors as a result of any restatements. Risk factors associated with our business, including some of the facts set forth herein, are detailed in the Company's Form 10-K/A for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2008 and Form 10-Q/A for the fiscal first quarter ended March 31, 2009, Form 10-Q/A for the fiscal second quarter ended June 30, 2009 and Form 10-Q for the fiscal third quarter ended September 30, 2009.

For additional information, contact Julie O'Connor at julie.oconnor@wayne.edu or 313-577-8845.

Dr. David Rueda and Dr. Lou Romano

DETROIT– Wayne State researchers have for the first time observed the movement of a single molecule of DNA polymerase as it incorporates nucleotides one by one. More significantly, they have identified a previously unknown step that they speculate is part of the proofreading process known to prevent the polymerase from producing cancer-causing mutations.

Louis Romano, Ph.D., professor of chemistry, and David Rueda, Ph.D., assistant professor of chemistry in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, were published in the Dec. 4, 2009 early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences for their observation. In addition, Thomas Christian, a former WSU chemistry graduate student who is now a postdoctoral associate at Yale University, played a key role in the study.

During DNA replication, DNA polymerase incorporates nucleotides into a DNA chain using the strand of the parental DNA as a template to produce two identical double-stranded product DNA molecules. To maintain proper function of the daughter cells, it is crucial that this process be carried out accurately and the structure of DNA polymerases have evolved so that they only make a mistake once in ~100,000 nucleotides incorporated. An integral part of this process is the ability of most DNA polymerase to remove incorrectly incorporated nucleotides in a process referred to as proofreading. Rueda and Romano believe that they have identified a new step in the proofreading process that helps maintain the incredible accuracy of DNA replication. This process prevents mutations that can lead to potentially deadly diseases such as cancer.

“DNA polymerase has the extremely important job of building DNA accurately,” Romano said. “It is fundamentally important to understand how polymerase incorporates nucleotides, so that we may also understand why they sometimes make mistakes that cause genetic mutations and oftentimes disease.”

As part of the movement of the DNA polymerase as it traveled across a DNA template, Romano and Rueda observed the polymerase oscillating between the position where nucleotides are attached, and a position where it possibly “checks” that the correct nucleotide was incorporated.

The discovery was achieved using single-molecule microscopy, a method that Rueda brought to Wayne State that allows researchers to observe the movement of single molecules in real time.

"Scientists have been trying to understand the mechanism by which DNA polymerase acts for more than 60 years,” Rueda said. “It is well established that proofreading is a part of this process, but the step we see in our experiments has never before been observed,” Rueda said.

The next challenge for Rueda and Romano is to further define this new step in DNA replication and acquire more evidence for its proofreading function. They also hope to observe a polymerase making a mistake during replication – something they have not yet observed because it happens so rarely.

“These studies represent the first step in a long-range program that we hope will greatly improve our understanding of an enzyme vital to maintaining our genetic information and preventing diseases such as cancer,” Rueda said.
The full paper can be viewed at http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2009/12/01/0908640106.full.pdf.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Fazlul H. Sarkar, Ph.D., professor of pathology in the Karmanos Cancer Center at Wayne State University’s School of Medicine and resident of Plymouth Township, Mich., received more than $300,000 from the National Institutes of Health through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 that was signed into law by President Barack Obama. The award is an expansion on two research grants totaling $3 million which investigate the potential role of B-DIM, a small molecule found in leafy vegetables, in pancreatic cancer prevention and treatment.

Pancreatic cancer has one of the worst prognoses of any solid tumor type and is the fourth leading cause of all cancer deaths in the United States. The median survival time is six months after diagnosis, with only three percent of those diagnosed surviving five years. The low survival rate has been attributed to the ability of pancreatic cancer cells to grow and spread faster than most other cancers, a phenomenon which makes the disease difficult to treat.

Previous studies by Sarkar’s lab found B-DIM to be a potent inhibitor of expression of genes that are known to activate signaling pathways that lead to cancer cell growth, migration, invasion and angiogenesis and inducing apoptosis. The current study focuses on determining the mechanism by which B-DIM inhibits these pathways and testing the molecule’s effectiveness in pancreatic cancer prevention and treatment using two recently developed animal models. The results could aid in designing preventative or therapeutic approaches for saving the lives of pancreatic cancer patients.

“Our lab has shown that B-DIM can significantly inhibit the pathways that are instrumental in the progression of pancreatic cancer,” Sarkar said. “Now we want to better understand the effect of this molecule on several genes essential to cancer progression and elucidate exactly how B-DIM works. The knowledge gained from this study could significantly increase our ability to prevent and treat this very aggressive form of cancer for which there is no cure.”

In addition to his research, Sarkar was recently selected to be an associate editor of Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR) that publishes significant, original studies in all areas of basic, clinical, translational, epidemiological and prevention research on cancer and cancer-related biomedical studies. He was also recently chosen as one of 11 senior editors in the country for Molecular Cancer Therapeutics, another journal of the AACR.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

The Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute is one of 40 National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer centers in the United States. Caring for nearly 6,000 new patients annually on a budget of $216 million, conducting more than 700 cancer-specific scientific investigation programs and clinical trials, Karmanos is among the nation’s best cancer centers. Through the commitment of 1,000 staff, including nearly 300 physicians and researchers on faculty at the Wayne State University School of Medicine, and supported by thousands of volunteer and financial donors, Karmanos strives to prevent, detect and eradicate all forms of cancer. Its long-term partnership with the WSU School of Medicine enhances the collaboration of critical research and academics related to cancer care. Karmanos is southeastern Michigan’s most preferred hospital for cancer care according to annual surveys conducted by the National Research Corporation. For more information call 1-800-KARMANOS or visit http://www.karmanos.org.

The study is enrolling patient participants and will use Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) to create picture-like scans of the brain and genetic samples obtained through blood and/or saliva to learn more about how different treatments affect the brain.

Patient participants must have the following characteristics:

• Be 6 to 19 years old.
• Have been diagnosed with OCD or suspect they may have OCD.
• Cannot wear braces or cannot be pregnant.

Control patient participants must have the following characteristics:

• Be 6 to 19 years old.
• Not have a personal or immediate family history of psychiatric or medical illness.
• Cannot wear braces or cannot be pregnant.

All participants are required to have biological parent participation and must be of European Caucasian descent. Financial compensation will be provided to those that qualify for the study.

 OCD is a severe, prevalent and chronically disabling disease. It affects approximately 1 to 3 percent of the population nationwide and about 50 percent of all OCD cases begin in childhood and adolescence.

For more information about the study, please call (313) 745-4645. 
                                                                                                                  

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit www.research.wayne.edu.

For more information about this press release, contact Julie O'Connor, director of research communications at ag2712@wayne.edu.

 David Rueda, Ph.D., assistant professor of chemistry in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, was published in the November edition of Nature Structural & Molecular Biology for uncovering and characterizing dynamics of two key molecules in the spliceosome, an enzyme critical to the body’s gene editing process.

The study focused on RNA, a nucleic acid similar in composition to DNA, which is sometimes referred to as DNA’s “chemical cousin.” RNA’s single chain of nucleotides contains the code used to build proteins in cells. The role of the spliceosome is to cut out unneeded portions of the RNA chain and paste the remaining regions together, and this edited RNA strand becomes the “recipe” for the production of a protein.

Spliceosomal errors can be lethal to the cell and have been linked to numerous cancers and neurodegenerative disorders. “Even a single nucleotide error can impair normal cell functioning,” Rueda said. “Errors in splicing have been linked to cancer, Alzheimer’s and other neurodegenerative diseases. That’s why it is so important to understand how the process works – so we can prevent it from working incorrectly.”

In order to gain a fundamental understanding of spliceosomal function, Rueda focused on RNA molecules U2 and U6, which are essential for catalyzing the cutting and pasting processes of the spliceosome. “The first step toward understanding how RNA works is learning the three-dimensional form of the molecule and its dynamics,” Rueda said.

Previous studies on the structure of U2 and U6 yielded different results, with one suggesting the molecule has a 3-helix structure and another suggesting a 4-helix structure. Using single molecule spectroscopy and florescent dyes, Rueda’s lab characterized the structure U2 and U6. They found that the structures adopt both previously suggested forms and they observed a third, previously unseen structural conformation. “Our lab is the first to show these two RNA molecules, which are the heart of the spliceosome, are dynamic in nature,” he said. “They switch from one form to another, which we suspect is related to different activation states.

“In over 30 years of research on the spliceosome, this is the first time all three structural conformations and their dynamics have been characterized,” Rueda said. “Just like mechanics need to understand how an engine works normally before they can repair a damaged one, this discovery provides important details about the function of this critical biological step in cellular protein formation. Greater understanding of the spliceosome could lead to new ways to prevent and treat devastating diseases for which there are currently no cures.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. To learn more about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.
 

For more information, contact Amy Oprean at 313-577-1494 or oprean@wayne.edu

“Our new NVH testing product will provide engineers and technicians with a portable, easy-to-use and low-cost tool for noise diagnostics” said Mr. Sergio Mazza, president and CEO of SenSound. “The MicroScribe 6G2LX digitizer will substantially reduce testing time and complexity by allowing rapid collection of multiple sound measurements and SenSound’s proprietary software will allow for the rapid identification of noise sources correlating product vibrations with noise emissions.”

Addressing machinery noise is an important health, safety and product quality issue. Using SenSound technology, manufacturers of products and components in a variety of industries, from wind turbines to consumer products, will be able to identify and abate undesirable sound and vibrations in a faster, more cost-effective manner than currently available technology

Revware President Tom Welsh noted, “The MicroScribe G series of 3D digitizers has been the choice of animators, engineers and designers for many years for capturing the physical properties of three-dimensional objects and accurately translate them into 3D models. We are excited about combining the MicroScribe mechanical tracking technology with SenSound’s acoustic holography technology to create an easy-to-use tool for noise diagnostics, product development and sound engineering applications.”

SenCAH was developed based on patented technology known as HELS, or Helmholtz Equation Least Squares developed by Dr. Sean Wu, Distinguished Professor at Wayne State University. According to Dr. Hilary Ratner, Vice President for Research at Wayne State University, “SenSound’s compact acoustic holography system can fundamentally change the approach to detection and abatement of noise and vibrations in engineering applications.” She continued, “SenSound’s technology offers a more efficient means to identify unwanted noises in any manufactured product, ultimately creating quieter environments that will improve the health and lives of many people.”

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ABOUT SENSOUND
SenSound, LLC is a privately held company based in Detroit, Michigan. SenSound’s award winning patented technology was initially developed in the College of Engineering at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan. SenSound diagnostic software creates three-dimensional digital images of sound as it travels through space and time. The software is unique in its ability to quickly, accurately and cost effectively map sound sources on arbitrary three-dimensional surfaces. SenSound quality control software distinguishes between environmental noise and source object noise without the need for sound enclosures. SenSound technology has broad applications in product design, development and manufacturing where noise needs to be identified, understood and eliminated, or where manufacturing and component defects need to be identified. To learn more about SenSound, visit http://www.sensound.com.

ABOUT REVWARE
Revware, Inc. is a privately held company founded in 1992 with offices in Raleigh, NC and San Jose, CA. Revware’s MicroScribe line of 3D digitizers provides a cost-effective desktop solution for the gathering of point and vector data in a wide range of applications. Revware also produces RevWorks® reverse modeling software that is used to capture 3D information directly into popular CAD software. Revware’s products are distributed world-wide. To learn more about Revware, MicroScribe and RevWorks, visit http://www.revware.net.

ABOUT WAYNE STATE UNIVERSITY
Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.
 

For more information, contact: Julie O'Connor, Wayne State University at julie.oconnor@wayne.edu or Sergio Mazza at sergio.mazza@sensound.com

Michigan's University Research Corridor, Biotechnology Business Consultants and BioArbor are sponsoring sessions with two NIH program directors: Rosemarie Hunziker, program director of the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering and Kay Etzler, program analyst, NIH SBIR/STTR Program Office.

The sessions include:
NIH Funding for Academic Institutions
New proposal formats; different scoring; early stage investigations; ARRA funding opportunities - 2009 has been a year of change at NIH. Attend this URC sponsored session to learn more about NIH initiatives focused on academic and university researchers.
Meet One-on-One with NIH
Schedule a one-on-one meeting with one of two NIH program directors. Appointments are limited to Michigan-based participants and must be scheduled in advance. A brief summary of the topic to be discussed will be required when requesting an appointment.
NIH Funding for Life Science Companies and Entrepreneurs: SBIR/STTR and Beyond.....
From SBIR/STTR funding, to commercialization assistance programs, to other relevant NIH grant opportunities, hear directly from NIH program staff about the ins and outs of NIH funding for life science companies. Ample time for questions will be provided.

DATE AND TIMES: Wednesday, Nov. 11 in Ann Arbor at 10 a.m., 1:30 and 5 p.m.

PLACES: The 10 a.m. event is at Blau Auditorium, at the U-M Ross School of Business, 701 Tappan Street, Ann Arbor. For a map:
 http://www.umich.edu/news/Blau_Aud.jpg

The 1:30 and 5 p.m. events are at SPARK Central, 330 E. Liberty, Ann Arbor. For a map:
http://www.annarborusa.org/about-us/directions/

SPONSORS: Michigan's University Research Corridor, BioArbor and Biotechnology Business Consultants .

TO REGISTER:
 http://urcmich.org/events/nih.html

WEB LINKS:
More on the event:  http://urcmich.org/events/nih.html

More on the URC:  www.urcmich.org

More on BioArbor:  http://www.bioarbor.com/

More on Biotechnology Business Consultants:  http://www.bioconsultants.com/

For more information, contact Joe Serwach at jserwach@umich.edu or 734-647-1844, or Julie O'Connor at julie.oconnor@wayne.edu or 313-577-8845

“For me it’s sort of a spiritual thing; getting my hands in the soil really connects me to the place,” Ahee said. “Now, after a few years, I am just so in love with the city. I want to do what I can to bring positive change to the community.”

Ahee is a student leader for SEED Wayne, a program directed by Kami Pothukuchi, Ph.D. SEED Wayne is a largely volunteer-based organization that builds sustainable food systems on Wayne State’s campus and in Detroit communities.

For almost all SEED Wayne projects, Pothukuchi is conducting “action research” to develop models for sustainable food systems in urban areas. Ahee carries out much of the day-to-day leg work including coordinating volunteers, conducting surveys and helping with focus groups. He also works with Pothukuchi on documentation, analysis and problem-solving.

The project on which he has spent much of his time is healthy corner stores, based near the Capuchin Soup Kitchen on Detroit’s east side. Ahee was instrumental in setting up the project and has continually worked with the stores to overcome the many obstacles in their transition to offering produce. “We’ve learned that it takes a store owner really wanting to improve the health of the community, rather than making an immediate profit, to get an effort like this off the ground,” he said.

Ahee’s experience in action-based research for SEED Wayne has given him a comprehensive understanding of what it takes to work in the non-profit sector of Detroit, from valuable research methods to knowledge of the time and effort needed to building strong partnerships and community relationships.

“I’ve learned a lot about the real needs and obstacles that people have,” he said. “Setting up a community garden doesn’t solve the problem of food access – it’s not that simple. But you have to build trust with community members in order to work through other cultural and economic obstacles.”

After graduation, Ahee hopes to attend medical school and then open a free clinic that combines food access and healthcare. The clinic would include the holistic approaches to healthy living he has learned in his time working with SEED Wayne gardens and community research projects.

“Will hadn’t taken any classes on research or data analysis, but he’s grown to understand the principles of research from the various projects he’s worked on for SEED Wayne,” Pothukuchi said. “He’s committed to Detroit and he’s committed to sustainability. It will be interesting to see where this experience will take him next.”

For more information, contact Amy Oprean at oprean@wayne.edu.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

A team of researchers at Wayne State University have set out to change this, with the support of a five-year, $5.7 million grant from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health & Human Development, both of the National Institutes of Health. The project, “Interventionist Procedures for Adherence to Weight Loss Recommendations in Black Adolescents,” will bring together a multidisciplinary team of researchers in adolescent health behavior change, motivation and learning and provider-family interactions within urban populations.

The obesity center will be led by Sylvie Naar-King, Ph.D., associate professor of pediatrics in WSU’s School of Medicine and resident of Clawson, and K-L Catherine Jen, Ph.D., professor and chair of nutrition and food science in WSU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and resident of Bloomfield Hills. Collaborators from the Medical University of South Carolina, as well as nine departments and institutes at Wayne State University, will be involved in the project.

According to Naar-King, this intervention project has three components: strategies to increase extrinsic motivation; strategies to increase intrinsic motivation; and skills development. Primary skills of parental monitoring of the adolescent’s eating and exercise will be key, as will self-monitoring of eating and exercising, managing hunger and cravings, and portion control. “What we are doing is specifying what needs to happen to actually learn and use skills,” said Naar-King. “By increasing intrinsic and extrinsic motivation through various methods, participants will develop and practice skills in the context in which they occur. An example is having a community health worker present at meal times to help the family measure food portions.”

This multistage trial will guide adolescents and their families through various sets of treatment options. Through these phases, the participants will learn and practice skills that will help them adhere to weight loss strategies through healthier eating options and improved exercise programs.

“When it comes to obesity prevention and treatment, it is not one-size-fits-all,” said Jen. “Hence it is important to provide options to adolescents in order to identify the optimal strategy.”

Recruitment of family participants will begin in early 2010 and will involve 58 families. The second phase will include 200 families to be recruited in late 2010. Participants will be recruited from Children’s Hospital of Michigan (CHM) Adolescent Medicine Clinic and General Pediatrics Clinic, the new Health and Fitness Clinic at CHM Pediatrics, Endocrinology Clinic, school health clinics and various community centers and local health fairs.

Media contact: Julie O'Connor, ag2712@wayne.edu

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit www.research.wayne.edu.

The team created the site, www.researchtoolkit.org, to enhance the efficiency of research, including developing research networks, launching and managing projects, and sharing study results or other products such as data sets, tools and training resources.

Researchers are increasingly finding strength in unity. By collaborating with investigators at multiple sites, they can pool data and study larger and more diverse groups of people in various settings. Collaboration helps studies achieve more “generalizability” and greater statistical power. This makes it easier to definitively answer questions about which kinds of health care work best to improve the health of Americans.

“ResearchToolkit.org will enable clinical investigators from multiple institutions to collaborate more efficiently and effectively on health research,” said National Center for Research Resources Director Barbara M. Alving, M.D. “Ultimately, this new, Web-based resource may help improve community engagement nationwide.”

The development of the research toolkit was funded by the Clinical and Translational Science Award program, which is led by NCRR, part of the National Institutes of Health. The CTSA program fosters collaboration to speed the translation of research into practice and to engage communities in clinical research. The research toolkit will be key in strengthening clinical and translational research.

Anne Victoria Neale, Ph.D., M.P.H., a collaborating investigator in the project, said the site is now available to all Wayne State University researchers.

“The site provides an assemblage of excellent research resources, particularly focusing on community-based and multi-site research,” said Dr. Neale, a professor in the School of Medicine’s Department of Family Medicine and Public Health Sciences. “However, some also apply to single-site research. We call it a toolkit because we focused on practical resources such as templates and checklists. We also included some theoretical resources that were judged as outstanding as well.”

The resources are organized under five headings reflecting the life cycle of a research project, from “Building Collaborations” to “Developing Proposals to Starting up a Study” to “Conducting and Managing Projects” and “Disseminating and Closing Research.” Under each heading are subheadings with a number indicating the number of resources that relate to the subheading.

“The final heading is ‘Resources for Training,’ which are excellent background and training materials,” Dr. Neale said. “On the left column of the home page are some excellent resources and utilities that we wanted to highlight as well (‘Cool Tools’).”

At the bottom of the home page researchers will find a “provide feedback” link, where they can suggest other resources or let site organizers know what they found “useful” or “not very useful.”

To ensure the site’s content is maximally useful, the team surveyed members of the CTSA program who conduct community-based research, along with leaders of Practice-Based Research Networks. As part of the survey, respondents were invited to contribute resources of their own, and identify unmet needs and barriers to conducting research efficiently.

“The result is a site built by the researchers, for the researchers,” said lead investigator Sarah Greene, M.P.H., a research associate at Group Health Research Institute, a non-proprietary, public-domain research institution. Programs such as the National Institutes of Health’s CTSA initiative and its recent Grand Opportunities funding opportunity have spurred substantial growth in multi-center research, she explained. “This means today’s researchers are challenged to quickly surmount the logistical and operational barriers to project development. We built the ResearchToolkit.org site to help them.”

The site was developed as part of a project known as PRIMER, or Partnership-driven Resources to IMprove and Enhance Research. The NCRR awarded PRIMER to the Institute for Translational Health Sciences at the University of Washington. The study team included researchers from Group Health Research Institute, Wayne State University, the University of Washington and Duke University.

“Working with multiple sites on budgeting, developing the science, initiating the research study and writing manuscripts can be especially challenging” said Rowena Dolor, M.D., M.H.S., co-investigator and primary care research network director with the Duke University Medical Center. The site’s “toolkit” includes links to regulatory training, authorship guidelines and templates for consent forms. Responses from survey participants and systematic searches of existing large research networks helped the team identify which tools to include.

Having these resources reside on a single Web site is an efficiency measure itself. “There’s no need for researchers and project teams to start from scratch,” said Laura-Mae Baldwin, M.D., M.P.H., a co-investigator on the project, University of Washington professor of Family Medicine and practicing clinician.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit www.research.wayne.edu. 

For more information, contact Julie O'Connor, director of research communications, at ag2712@wayne.edu.

Wayne State University secured its third successive round of funding from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development for the center Sept. 22. The five-year, $2.3 million grant runs through 2014.

Theodore B. Jones, M.D., F.A.C.O.G., interim chairman of the WSU Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, said the center is one of only 20 nationwide. “This grant means that Wayne State will continue to be the pacesetter in creating women’s reproductive health scholars for new and effective treatments of the future,” said Jones, who also is director of the Division of Maternal Fetal Medicine. “Down the road, patients will be able to take satisfaction in knowing that they are being treated by someone who has invested a significant amount of time in learning how to create the best practices in women’s reproductive health care and how to treat the problems that plague our patients on a daily basis.”

The grant will allow faculty to spend as much as 70 percent of their time conducting research in women’s reproductive health issues. That investment in research is crucial, Jones said, because physicians have to split time between research and seeing patients. This current round of funding ensures research time without sacrificing time spent caring for women. As many as three clinician-scientists will take part in the program at any one time, Jones said, and as many as six will be trained and conduct research during the life of this grant. “The quality of the health care we provide depends on us being able to understand better the medical problems of our patients,” Jones said. “There is a deep need to be involved in research, and to be able to fund the time it takes to conduct research.”

The grant is competitive, said Valerie Parisi, M.D., M.P.H., M.B.A., interim dean of the School of Medicine, with a multitude of medical schools and health centers applying for funding. “The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development recognizes the critical research we conduct in the area of maternal and fetal health,” she said. “We have many talented people working on groundbreaking research that leads to healthier births, and it’s crucial that we continue that effort. Getting newborns and mothers off to a healthy start not only helps families, it also addresses issues that could lead to greater demands on a strained health care system.”

In conjunction with the grant, WSU has identified two educational partners – Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tenn., and the University of Puerto Rico School of Medicine - that may send physician-researchers to be trained and share research in Detroit.

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research university offering more than 350 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to more than 31,000 students. Founded in 1868, the Wayne State University School of Medicine is the nation's largest single-campus medical school with more than 1,200 medical students. In addition to undergraduate medical education, the school offers master's degree, Ph.D. and M.D.-Ph.D. programs in 14 areas of basic science to about 400 students annually. More than one-half of the School of Medicine's alumni remain in Michigan to practice medicine after graduation. With more than 17,000 alumni, the Wayne State University School of Medicine is among the most productive providers of excellent undergraduate and graduate medical education in the country.

For more information, contact Phil Van Hulle at pvanhulle@med.wayne.edu

Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT) is one of the most common genetic nerve diseases, affecting 1 in 2,500 people, or 120,000 Americans. CMT causes progressive muscle weakness, painful foot deformities and walking difficulty. As the disease progresses, weakness and muscle atrophy occur in the hands, resulting in difficulty with fine motor skills. Symptoms vary from patient to patient, with pain ranging from mild to severe, with some patients relying on foot or leg braces or other orthopedic devices to maintain mobility. To date, no effective therapies are available for any form of CMT.

To address this issue, Dr. Michael Shy, M.D., professor of neurology in the School of Medicine, and resident of Bloomfield Hills, Mich., is leading the study which aims to provide insights into disease mechanisms, develop therapies and educate future research on inherited neuropathies such as CMT.

According to Shy, there are mutations in more than 40 different genes causing CMT in millions of patients throughout the world. “Modern genetics and cell biology make developing treatments for these disorders a realistic possibility,” said Shy. “However, many of the individual forms of CMT are rare, so to better understand the different forms of CMT and develop rational treatments for them requires national and international collaborations between neurologists and scientists.”

The project has specific goals geared toward establishing a Rare Disease Clinical Research Center (RDCRC) for the inherited neuropathies. In particular, the group will determine the natural history of the most common forms of CMT that currently lack this information. “At Wayne State, we have pioneered the natural history studies for the two most common forms of CMT - CMT1A and CMTX,” said Shy. “Our results are used by neurologists around the world to design clinical trials for these disorders. However, for the types of CMT to be studied in this project, we do not see enough patients at WSU to perform natural history studies by ourselves, hence the critical nature of having a national and international collaboration.”

In addition, the project aims to identify ‘modifier genes’ in CMT1A, the most common inherited neuropathy. CMT1A comprises about half of all the patients with CMT and is caused by an identical genetic mutation in all patients. In collaboration with the Human Genomic Institute at the University of Miami, the group will use 21st century gene sequencing techniques to identify these modifier genes that will help determine how severely patients will be affected. Using the same techniques, the University of Miami researchers will identify the genetic cause of CMT in families in which only a few members have been affected, something previously not possible.

The project also will study children affected by CMT. The consortium will develop a pediatric scoring system that will be used around the world to measure impairment and progression of disability in children with CMT. The collaborators also will establish a new CMT Web site to provide patients, their families and scientists around the world with the latest CMT information. In addition, the consortium will carry out an international training program for clinical and research doctors to train the next generation of researchers for CMT and other neurodegenerative diseases.

Wayne State University has one of the largest and most comprehensive CMT programs in the world. The program is translational, combining patient care and patient clinical research with animal and cellular models of CMT. Since 1996, WSU has evaluated more than 1,200 patients with CMT from more than 21 countries, five continents and 46 states in addition to Michigan, with funding coming from the National Institutes of Health, Muscular Dystrophy Association and Charcot-Marie-Tooth Association.

Along with Shy, project collaborators include Gyula Acsadi, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of neurology at WSU and director of the Pediatric MDA Clinic and Pediatric Neurology Clinical Division Chief at Children’s Hospital of Michigan; Steve Scherer, M.D., Ph.D., William Kelly professor of neurology and vice chair for research in neurology at the University of Pennsylvania; Mary M. Reilly, M.D., director of the neuropathy clinic at the National Hospital for neurology and neurosurgery in London, England, and head of the Peripheral Neuropathy component of the MRC Centre for Neuromuscular Diseases at Newcastle University and the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery; Francesco Muntoni, M.D., professor and consultant in paediatric neurology in the Dubowitz Neuromuscular Centre at the University College of London Institute of Child Health; Stephan Zuchner, M.D., associate professor of medicine, Miami Institute of Human Genomics, University of Miami; Jeffery Vance, M.D., professor of medicine and director of the division of human genomics, University of Miami; and David Herrmann, M.D., associate professor of neurology and pathology, School of Medicine, University of Rochester.

“This international project establishes Wayne State University’s Department of Neurology as the leading inherited neuropathy program in the U.S. and around the world,” said Dr. Robert Lisak, chair of neurology in the School of Medicine. Under Dr. Shy’s leadership, this consortium will bring us much closer to the development of effective treatments for the various forms of CMT.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Media Contact: Julie O'Connor, julie.oconnor@wayne.edu or 313-577-8845

Two keynote speakers will headline this year’s event. Rick Inatome, Michigan native, life-long entrepreneur and co-founder of two multi-million dollar companies will talk about the tremendous opportunities available to businesses during times of economic downturn. Inatome, who today is managing director of Sterling Partners, a $4.2 billion private-equity fund with 34 portfolio companies, is considered Michigan’s first computer entrepreneur and has played a key role in helping guide Michigan’s business and education technology infrastructure.

Tom Murphy, former mayor of Pittsburgh, guided the revitalization of Pittsburgh by directing new investment into the city to refurbish neighborhoods, build world-class facilities and boost the economy by transitioning the city from heavy industrial to high technology and life sciences.

E2 Detroit is focused on establishing Michigan as an enterprise hub and Wayne State University as a premier training ground for entrepreneurship. Attendees will gain knowledge to create start-up companies and generate new jobs. From topics like, "Building a Culture of Entrepreneurship" to "Selecting the Right Business Model," attendees will learn important information on timely issues led by nationally and locally recognized leaders in the business development community.

In addition, the event will host a competition for Wayne State students who have an idea for starting a company. The E2 Detroit Elevator Pitch competition will allow students to present 60 second elevator pitches to describe their new company ideas. Students will be judged on their ability to present a business case that appears feasible and profitable; is unique and creative; and has a potential market niche and competitive advantage.

“In addition to giving our students an opportunity to pitch their business ideas, E2 Detroit will help business entrepreneurs come up with new ideas to revitalize their companies which is critical in these difficult economic times,” said Judy Johncox, director of business services at WSU. “Earlier this summer, three major events called ‘FastTrac to the Future’ were held at Wayne State University. They were highly successful; however, this event differs in that the focus is on people who are already in business and seek to grow their business by identifying new sources of funding, new high quality staff as well as new technology that may be available through Wayne State University’s Technology Commercialization office.”
Registration is now open. To learn more about E2 Detroit, visit http://www.e2detroit.wayne.edu today.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu

Media Contact: Julie O’Connor
Voice: (313) 577-8845
E-mail: ag2712@wayne.edu
 

Retinopathy is the most common cause of acquired blindness in diabetic patients. The condition is a result of damage to the small blood vessels in the retina, the layer of cells in the back of the eye that is responsible for sending signals to the brain.
All people with diabetes are at risk of developing retinopathy, and the risk increases the longer a person has diabetes. Between 40 percent and 45 percent of Americans with diabetes suffer from retinopathy, according to the National Eye Institute. The condition’s onset can begin with no or few symptoms.

Dr. Kowluru’s research focuses on determining the role of matrix metalloproteinases-9 (MMP-9), a member of the family of metalloproteinases that regulates major biological functions, including apoptosis and matrix degradation, in the pathogenesis of diabetic retinopathy. She believes that activation of signaling cascade of H-Ras (a small molecular weight G-protein) in diabetes activates MMP-9, accelerating capillary cell loss in the retina, and ultimately leading to the development of diabetic retinopathy. She will investigate the mechanism through which H-Ras activates MMP-9 in the retina in diabetes, and how MMP-9-dependent cellular signaling pathways contribute to the loss of capillary cells.

She explained that she expects to find that the activation of H-Ras in the retina in diabetes regulates MMP-9, and activated MMP-9 accelerates cell loss in the capillaries of the retina by damaging the mitochondria and speeding cell death.

“We believe that by understanding the role of MMP-9 in the pathogenesis of diabetic retinopathy, the compounds that neutralize MMP-9 can be identified to inhibit its development,” Dr. Kowluru said. “This should have immense clinical implications because MMP inhibitors are already being used in clinical trials for other diseases, and our results are expected to lay ground for a possibility to use them to inhibit retinopathy, the sight-threatening disease that diabetic patients fear the most.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

For more information, contact Phil Van Hulle at pvanhulle@med.wayne.edu or Julie O'Connor at julie.oconnor@wayne.edu.

Inatome, who today is managing director of Sterling Partners, a $4.2 billion private-equity fund with 34 portfolio companies, says that Michigan companies need to think proactively and recognize that when the economy is weak it’s a good time to reassess and sharpen their market position.

“In a downturn, companies can achieve a 20 to 25 percent improvement in operating performance,” said Inatome. “During these times, companies have very little to lose and a great deal to gain. At the same time it requires taking a close look at their competitive advantage, looking for new opportunities and taking some risks.”

According to Inatome, companies should look for ways to strengthen their competitive advantage by taking a hard look at two aspects of company performance: 1) their existing processes and 2) the company’s internal culture. Both of these, according to Inatome, represent major factors for creating a stronger business model that is well positioned for economic recovery.

“No matter what your business strategy is, this is a great time to reassess and sharpen your position," Inatome said. “Strengthening existing processes and creating a company culture that produces measurable results are both essential to building competitive advantage.”

Inatome is considered Michigan’s first computer entrepreneur and played a key role in helping to guide Michigan's business and education technology infrastructure. He was appointed chairman of the Michigan Information Network and Michigan Technology Council by former Michigan Governor John Engler and served as president of Microsoft's advisory council and on the advisory boards of IBM, HP and Apple. He currently serves on the boards of AAA Michigan, R.L. Polk & Company and Saturn Electronics & Engineering.

“Although the current economic climate may be discouraging, there are tremendous opportunities for businesses to position their companies even when times seem chaotic,” said Judy Johncox, director of business services at WSU. “Michigan does offer a viable business environment for young companies, and Rick’s experience in building unique corporate cultures, scaling businesses and leveraging technology for competitive advantage will offer E2 Detroit attendees great advice from a world-class business leader.” 

Built upon the foundation of entrepreneurship and excellence, E2 Detroit provides attendees with the opportunity to network with other entrepreneurs. Business experts and CEOs of local start-ups will share their successes and challenges to provide “real world” insight to entrepreneurs seeking practical knowledge. E2 Detroit is focused on establishing Michigan as an enterprise hub and Wayne State University as a premier training ground for entrepreneurship.

“The E2 Detroit conference is geared towards business entrepreneurs, and attracts nationally-known speakers and a growing audience of entrepreneurs,” said Johncox. “Earlier this summer, three major events called ‘FastTrac to the Future’ were held at Wayne State University. They were highly successful, however, this event differs in that the focus is on people who are already in business and seek to grow their business by identifying new sources of funding, new high quality staff as well as new technology that may be available through Wayne State University’s Technology Commercialization office.”

Registration is now open. To learn more about E2 Detroit, visit http://www.e2detroit.wayne.edu today. 
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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Media Contact: Julie O’Connor
Voice: (313) 577-8845
E-mail: ag2712@wayne.edu
 

Ambika Mathur, Ph.D., associate dean of WSU’s Graduate School and professor of pediatrics in the School of Medicine; Deepak Kamat, M.D., Ph.D., professor and vice chairman of education in pediatrics; and Prashant Mahaja, M.D., associate professor of pediatrics, will use an $894,493 grant from the National Institutes of Health to fund their two-year study, “Comparison of the Effectiveness of CAM Therapies in Pediatric Patients Undergoing Sedation.” The grant comes via the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act economic stimulus bill.

The goal of the study, Dr. Mathur said, is to compare the effectiveness of three complementary and alternative medicine therapies in reducing the level of stress and anxiety in pediatric patients ages 1 through 12 who are undergoing sedation for imaging studies. If the therapies work, they could reduce the need for higher doses of intravenous sedation medicines or multiple sedation medications in young children.

“We hope to find that non-invasive complementary and alternative therapies reduce the need for intravenous sedative medications in children undergoing multiple MRIs for conditions such as brain tumors because these sedative medications have several adverse effects on the children,” said Dr. Mathur, who also serves as assistant dean of the combined degree programs and postdoctoral affairs. “For MRIs, children in this age group are sedated to reduce anxiety and to keep them still, because if they move even a bit the MRI does not work.”

The drugs used to sedate children in this age group, she said, present a higher side effect risk, and have been associated with a number of adverse reactions, including airway obstruction, cardiovascular problems such as brachycardia and syncope, respiratory distress, allergic reactions and mental confusion.

The three methods that will be tested in the study include passive music therapy, active music therapy with a certified music therapist and distraction procedures conducted by a child life specialist. Passive music therapy involves listening to music of one’s choice via headphones while an intravenous line is placed. In active music therapy, a certified therapist engages the child in making or playing music or singing. The goals of the music therapy are to promote relaxation and reduce stress and anxiety before and during intravenous line placement. The therapist and child may use any number of instruments and song selections based on the patient’s musical preference. The therapist will vary tempo, volume and melody to meet the patient’s level of agitation and bring them to a more relaxed state.
Distraction therapy involves the use of items or techniques appropriately matched to the child’s age and development. A child life specialist might use bubbles, a View Master, I-Spy book, squeeze ball, a handheld game, board games or counting and deep breathing during IV placement.

Dr. Mathur said the research team anticipates that the distraction therapy will be the most effective of the methods to be tested in reducing anxiety.

The study will involve 400 children undergoing multiple MRI studies at Children’s Hospital of Michigan. The researchers will assess the outcomes of the alternative therapies by measuring the amount of sedative medications administered compared to controls as well as the effect on immunological markers such as inflammatory and pre-inflammatory cytokines and on the levels of the stress hormone cortisol.
“In addition, we will determine if the reduction in the sedative medication use will result in reduced recovery time and reduced length of stay in the hospital, thereby resulting in net cost savings to the families and to the health care providers,” Dr. Mathur said.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Media Contacts:  Julie O'Connor, Office of the Vice President for Research, 313-577-8845 or julie.oconnor@wayne.edu and Phil Van Hulle, School of Medicine, 313-577-6943, pvanhulle@med.wayne.edu.

Michigan’s University Research Corridor has grown in all competitive categories over the past two years, rising among the nation’s top research and development clusters for producing patents, businesses and graduates with high-tech related degrees.

A new annual economic impact study, “Empowering Michigan,” shows URC partners Michigan State University, the University of Michigan and Wayne State University have improved in several key benchmarks since the first study in 2007. The studies, which examine innovation clusters in other states, were conducted by Anderson Economic Group.

“Even in tough times, these three institutions are showing the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, making a $14.5 billion impact on Michigan’s economy, up nearly 10 percent,’’ said URC Executive Director Jeff Mason. “These institutions are producing both innovation and new company spinoffs that rival other major research regions of the nation and returning $16 for every dollar the state invests.

“We're third in patents granted (up from fifth two years ago); fourth in technology licenses (up from sixth); and we are producing an average of 20 new companies a year, more than one company a month for the past 60 months.”

The number of start-ups the URC universities helped cultivate in 2008 dramatically increased from the previous year going from 14 in 2007 to 28 in 2008, Mason said.

The URC also awarded the third largest number of high tech degrees (7,638), close behind Pennsylvania (7,713) and southern California (8,266).

The economic impact was actually $1.6 billion greater in the new 2009 report than in the initial 2007 study, AEG found. Meanwhile, the URC’s research spending grew to $1.4 billion, with most of that money coming into the state through federal grants.

“This is significant given that employment in most other industries and sectors in Michigan has declined since 2007,’’ said Caroline Sallee, lead author of the report and director of AEG’s Chicago office. “Growth in crucial R&D expenditures slowed between 2006-2007, mostly due to a 14 percent drop in state and local funding of the URC universities.’’

The university presidents have been working together toward common goals.

“We founded the URC in late 2006 agreeing that we must partner or perish and these numbers show the value of working together and tapping the power of this combined resource,’’ said U-M President Mary Sue Coleman.

MSU President Lou Anna Simon said, “In a global economy, we must continually benchmark ourselves against the best and brightest around the world. We’ve shown our state can and does compete with the best minds everywhere, every day. The URC develops the innovations and training students need for the fields that are growing or have the potential to grow.’’

Added WSU President Jay Noren: “Michigan’s economic diversification, and its return to prosperity, will take the kind of vision, imagination and technical expertise present in the University Research Corridor institutions. But even more than that, such a transformation will take people — skilled, knowledgeable and highly motivated men and women.”

The study found the research universities accounted for 93 percent of federal academic research dollars brought into Michigan; all three are among the top 75 of more than 600 U.S. research universities. The seven clusters examined together accounted for 20 percent of all research spending conducted by U.S. universities.

The report measures the Research Corridor universities against six comparable clusters in regions known as knowledge economy leaders: Boston’s 128 Corridor: Harvard University/Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Tufts University; Silicon Valley/Northern California: Stanford University, University of California-Berkley and UC-San Francisco; the Research Triangle: University of North Carolina, Duke University and N.C. State University; Chicago/Illinois: University of Chicago, Northwestern University and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Southern California: UCLA, University of Southern California and UC-San Diego; and Pennsylvania: Penn State University (all campuses), University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University.

The URC was founded to leverage the power of Michigan’s research universities to transform the state’s economy.

To read the complete report, visit:www.urcmich.org

The project, “Brain Chemistry and Genetics in Pediatric OCD,” led by WSU, with collaborative partners at the University of Michigan and the University of Toronto/The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), is focused on OCD, a severe, prevalent and chronically disabling disease. OCD affects approximately 1 to 3 percent of the population nationwide and about 50 percent of all OCD cases begin in childhood and adolescence.

“Initial findings at Wayne State University have shown that glutamate plays a key role in OCD,” said David Rosenberg, M.D., the Miriam L. Hamburger Endowed Chair of Child Psychiatry and professor of Psychiatry in the School of Medicine at Wayne State University and the principal investigator of the project. “Glutamate is the brain’s light switch which helps turn serotonin and other chemicals off and on. Our research has shown that glutamate abnormalities in OCD have significant treatment implications. This new study will further our research by combining imaging and genetics, something never assessed in OCD patients.”

Teaming up with Rosenberg is Gregory Hanna, M.D, associate professor of psychiatry and director of the Pediatric Anxiety and Tic Disorder Program at the University of Michigan. Hanna will lead recruiting efforts for patients and their clinical characterization. In addition, Paul Arnold, M.D., Ph.D., assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Toronto and SickKids, will lead the genetic studies. Wayne State University will lead the imaging studies at Children’s Hospital of Michigan.

By performing critical imaging and genetic tests of glutamate genes in 200 OCD and 200 healthy control patients, this group of scientists aims to examine glutamate changes in brain regions implicated in OCD, and to combine this information with a detailed exploration of variants within genes influencing glutamate transmission.

“Brain processes visualized using magnetic resonance imaging are thought to be closer to the action of genes compared with complex behavioral phenomena like obsessive-compulsive disorder,” said Arnold. “Therefore, we hope that combining the two powerful techniques of neuroimaging and genetics will help speed up the discovery of risk genes.”

Results will have significant scientific implications as well as key ‘translational’ importance in bringing research from the bench to the bedside with clinical ramifications. By combining unique clinical assessment, magnetic resonance imaging and genetics expertise, the team of researchers will investigate biological, genetic and behavioral variables that may one day lead to a better understanding of pediatric OCD, and in turn, the development of new diagnostic and treatment approaches.

“This imaging genetics project builds upon a series of genetic linkage and association studies conducted during the past 15 years,” said Hanna. “These studies indicate genetic variants affecting the glutamate system have a primary role in the development of OCD.”

“Dr. Rosenberg is a leading international expert in pediatric OCD,” said Gloria Heppner, associate vice president for research at WSU. “His expertise in the field draws patients from all over the country and world. With his discoveries to date on glutamate and with this collaborative project focusing on combining genetics and imaging, this team of leading scientists may open new doors for patients whose brains never receive an “all-clear” signal.”

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For more information, contact Julie O'Connor at julie.oconnor@wayne.edu, or 313-577-8845.

Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit www.research.wayne.edu.

Since March, Kollipara has shadowed Christian Kreipke, Ph.D., assistant professor of anatomy and cell biology in Wayne State University’s School of Medicine, as he works to develop a ground-breaking drug that could prevent the vascular effects of traumatic brain injury. Kollipara, who one day hopes to be a neurosurgeon, observed much of Kreipke’s preclinical work for Clazosentan, a drug that has been successful in animal models in preventing vessel constriction, or vasospasms, which occur when the head is impacted.

“While most of research has focused on edema and diffuse axonal injuries – aspects of the initial impact to the head – vasospasms can contribute to the secondary injuries that can appear weeks or months after the head impact,” Kreipke said. “Clazosentan, which is now beginning clinical trials, was proven to decrease the effects of endothelin, the peptide responsible for vessel constriction after impact.”
Kollipara observed surgery on the animals in which the neurotransmitter endothelin was induced to gauge its effect on vessel constriction. She also assisted in the behavioral studies that determined the effectiveness of the drug.

The experience gave Kollipara, who has previously shadowed pediatricians and internal medicine physicians at Henry Ford Hospital, a different view of her future career. “If you observe in an emergency room, you get to see all the practical uses of medical breakthroughs,” she said. “But here I got to experience the other side of it – the work that leads to treatments and how treatments actually work.”
Kollipara’s pursuit of a career in the medical field stems back to her interest in science in grade school in India and a desire to help people. She came to the U.S. at age six, and as a student at Troy High School she attended several Brain Bee competitions as well as the Northwest Neuroscience Camp, where her growing interest in the human brain led to her goal of becoming a neurosurgeon.

The death of her father to lung cancer her sophomore year further pushed Kollipara’s desire to study medicine. “It’s always been a dream of mine, but the experience with my dad made me understand even more that the medical field is my calling,” she said.

Kreipke, who attributes his own job shadowing experience to pursuing a Ph.D. from the Department of Psychiatry at Wayne State, was happy to take Kollipara under his wing. “I changed majors seven times before I knew what I really wanted to do. I would just take this class or that class, whatever sounded interesting, but until someone showed me what it was like to be in the field, I had no idea what it meant to have that as a career. So to meet someone who really does have some handle on what they want to do, I’m more than willing to give them first-hand experience.”

Although Kollipara has her goals set on being a neurosurgeon, her experience observing drug development will be important to her throughout her career, Kreipke said.“Especially in brain medicine, where the science changes daily, one of the things that makes successful clinicians is having a comprehensive understanding of how science moves from development to treatment,” Kreipke said. “I think that’s why WSU’s School of Medicine in particular really gives precedence to students who have had experiences in both research and clinical experience.”

As Kollipara returns to school to begin her senior year, she will continue to shadow Kreipke a few hours a week. She says her diverse experiences have grounded her with preparedness, perspective and a sense of community that will help her meet the challenges of pre-med, medical school and a career in the field.

“Being in Dr. Kreipke's lab has opened the door to many opportunities for me, including seeing exciting research in action, learning medical terminologies and theories, and has given me a pool of acquaintances of really great doctors and med school students who share the same interests in the same field as me. These benefits will not only help me with my college life, but will also make me be a better person and hopefully a better doctor.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

For more information, contact Amy Oprean at oprean@wayne.edu.

Claudio Verani, Ph.D., associate professor of chemistry and resident of Sterling Heights, Mich., along with co-investigators John Endicott, Ph.D., of Mount Clemens, Mich., and Bernhard Schlegel, Ph.D., of Bloomfield Township, Mich., both professors of chemistry in WSU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, received the funding for research aimed to better understand the fundamental mechanisms of water splitting, a process that yields dihydrogen, a clean, renewable alternative to petroleum.

Concerns for the planet’s limited oil resources, pollution and climate change have spurred interest in developing an alternative to oil-based fuel at an accelerated speed. Water splitting is one of the most commonly proposed approaches, where solar energy is used to produce the clean, renewable fuel dihydrogen and oxygen. However, there are several mechanisms of the process which must be understood before the technology can be utilized as a viable alternative. Among these are the multi-electronic nature of the process and the potential formation of damaging and highly reactive radical intermediates.

Verani’s research will address chemical issues such as how to design molecules containing several different metal centers capable of accumulating charge for water splitting, how to transfer these charges and how to promote the dissociation of hydrogen and oxygen. They will also investigate potential catalysts capable of forming films to splitting. “This research is at the forefront of understanding the basic principles mechanisms of water splitting, an integral step in advancing dihydrogen as a clean, renewable fuel that could help end U.S. dependence on foreign oil,” Verani said.

“Our approach is unique and innovative because it involves a comprehensive effort to understand the use of a heterometallic system in solution, at interfaces, and on surfaces. Our results will be relevant, if not pivotal, to the future design of cells that utilize renewable solar energy.”

The research is relevant to the Department of Energy’s continued interest in supporting scientific research in Basic Energy Science, including the development of new concepts and improvement of existing methods to assure a secure energy future.

“WSU was instrumental as a catalyst for Dr. Verani’s vital research through internal funding programs such as the President’s Research Enhancement Program and seed funding from the Office of the Vice President for Research,” said Hilary Ratner, Ph.D., vice president for research at WSU. “Wayne State has great strengths in renewable energy research, and these internal awards have stimulated research resulting in increased federal research awards, which will ultimately lead to job creation and potential start-up companies.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information on research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Media contact: Amy Oprean, oprean@wayne.edu or 313-577-1494

These funds will allow Mattoo to continue a study started in 2005 that is examining if long-term antibiotics are necessary in children with vesicoureteral reflux (VUR). In addition, the funds will allow recruitment and/or salary support for research coordinators at participating study sites across the country.

Vesicoureteral reflux is a common congenital abnormality that is associated with recurrent urinary tract infections in children. With normal urination, the bladder contracts and deposits the urine through the urethra. In children with VUR, there is an abnormal flow of urine that goes back up into the ureters and sometimes up to the kidneys. This reflux exposes the kidneys to infection, which can cause serious kidney damage. The injury to the kidneys may result in renal scarring, which may cause high blood pressure later in life, or even kidney failure.

“To prevent such damage and long-term effects, patients are currently treated with daily antibiotics for many years depending on the severity of their abnormality,” said Mattoo of Troy, Mich. “This collaborative study is testing the hypothesis that prolonged antibiotic prophylaxis does not reduce the frequency of urinary tract infections, nor reduce the risk of renal scarring or reverse VUR in children.”
Current treatment for VUR may not be necessary and may cause some harm, including resistance to antibiotics, requiring children to have expensive and painful radiology tests and surgical procedures.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

This Community Network Program funded by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health is building a comprehensive community-based program to reduce disparities of breast, prostate, colorectal and lung cancer that adversely affect older, underserved, African American adults in metropolitan Detroit. The recent award of $199,883 brings the project funding total to more than $3 million since the program was initially funded in 2005.

The program, led by Terrance Albrecht, Ph.D., professor of family medicine and public health sciences at WSU’s School of Medicine, interim associate center director of population sciences and interim program leader of population studies and prevention at KCI, is a catalyst for a community based movement to improve access to and engagement of interventions for cancer screening and early stage cancer detection, diagnosis and treatment. With the ultimate goal of eradicating cancer health disparities, Albrecht is leading community leaders, researchers and medical professionals to maintain education, research and training programs that reduce disparities, promote early detection, aid in treatment seeking and sustain interventions and research.

“This important collaboration represents the commitment of Wayne State University to focus on major issues in urban health,” said Gloria Heppner, Ph.D., associate vice president for research at WSU. “Dr. Albrecht and her associates are on the forefront of efforts to ensure that all Americans are able to receive the latest and best information on cancer, ways to prevent it, and ways to treat it.”
 

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit www.research.wayne.edu.

Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Center Located in mid-town Detroit, MI, the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Center is one of 40 National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer centers in the United States. Caring for nearly 6,000 new patients annually on a budget of $216 million, conducting more than 700 cancer-specific scientific investigation programs and clinical trials, Karmanos is among the nation’s best cancer centers. Through the commitment of 1,000 staff, including nearly 300 faculty members, and supported by thousands of volunteer and financial donors, Karmanos strives to prevent, detect and eradicate all forms of cancer. For more information call 1-800-KARMANOS or go to www.karmanos.org.

 Media Contact: Julie O'Connor, director of research communications, Wayne State University

Dr. Lichtenberg embraced the challenge of editing “Generations: Update on Dementia,” as an opportunity to present a balanced biopsychosocial approach to dementia that encourages meaningful and caring relationships with patients and their families. Because this topic is covered only once every 10 years, it can take a broader view of the critical trends in dementia diagnosis and care. “Our goal for this issue is to make information about Alzheimer’s and related dementias accessible and useful to policy planners, practitioners and researchers,” Dr. Lichtenberg said. “The scholars whose work appears in this issue are of the highest caliber. ‘Generations’ is a must-read for anyone working with older adults.”

Graduate-level courses in advanced battery systems for HEVs will be offered at the WSU College of Engineering this fall and spring of 2010. The courses target employed automotive engineers as well as displaced workers who meet the prerequisites.

“WSU, in conjunction with the state of Michigan and the Michigan Academy for Green Mobility (MAGM), is taking a big step forward in developing an engineering workforce with the specific knowledge and skills to design and manufacture automobiles for the 21st century,” said Sean Newell, board chairman for MAGM.

MAGM was established by DELEG in collaboration with automotive industry leaders to ensure that the state has enough trained workers to meet growing demand in this emerging green economy sector. MAGM provides certificate programs and works with educational institutions to provide short-term, targeted training programs that emphasize hands-on practical experience.

“Partnerships and collaborations among government, industry and universities are essential to growing economic sectors and jobs in the state during these extraordinary times,” said Ralph Kummler, dean of the College of Engineering. “Wayne State is proud to offer its expertise and lab facilities to support Michigan’s economy recovery.”

The advanced hybrid electric battery course will familiarize students with battery system design, applications and interconnectivity with other operating systems in HEVs. Students will learn “the basics” including such topics as power demand, thermal management and battery lifecycles.

Admission for the four-credit WSU course is selective with priority consideration given to employed engineers, engineering graduate students, employed technicians and engineering tech program students. Students must have a bachelor’s degree in engineering or related degree in the physical sciences.

The course will be team-taught by engineering faculty, HEV engineers from Delphi and General Motors and battery scientists from Ovonic Battery. Classroom lectures will be delivered at Wayne State University’s Division of Engineering Technology, with simultaneous videoconferencing at Wayne State’s Oakland Center in Farmington Hills and the Wayne State Michigan Technical Education Center at the Macomb Community College (MCC) south campus in Warren. The laboratories include WSU’s Vehicular Electronic Lab and Hybrid Power Systems Lab, and MCC’s Automotive Technology Laboratory. MCC is providing five HEVs for the experiments.

The first class will begin Sept. 7 and will include four hours of course instruction per week for 14 weeks, including 10 weeks (40 hours) of lectures and four weeks (16 hours) of laboratory time.

For more information contact: CP Yeh, chair, Division of Engineering Technology, Wayne State University, (313) 577-0800, yeh@eng.wayne.edu
 

Built upon the foundation of entrepreneurship and excellence, E2 Detroit provides attendees with the opportunity to network with other entrepreneurs. Business experts and CEOs of local start-ups will share their successes and challenges to provide “real world” insight to entrepreneurs seeking practical knowledge.

E2 Detroit is focused on establishing Michigan as an enterprise hub and Wayne State University as a premier training ground for entrepreneurship. Attendees will gain knowledge to create start-up companies and generate new jobs. From topics like, "Building a Culture of Entrepreneurship" to "Selecting the Right Business Model," attendees will learn important information on timely issues led by nationally and locally recognized leaders in the business development community.

“Through E2 Detroit, Wayne State and TechTown, in partnership with WWJ, are giving new life to the Michigan economy by inspiring idea generators to explore entrepreneurial opportunities,” said Judy Johncox, director of business services in WSU’s Office of the Vice President for Research and TechTown. “This growing entrepreneurial spirit on WSU’s campus is advancing innovation and creativity, which are so essential to Michigan’s future.”

Registration is now open. To learn more about E2 Detroit, visit http://www.e2detroit.wayne.edu today.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Media Contact: Julie O’Connor
Voice: (313) 577-8845
E-mail: ag2712@wayne.edu
 

The 32 grants include 27 totaling more than $11.2 million from the National Institutes of Health – the second largest number of NIH grants in the state for this program. The university also has received four grants totaling $1.7 million from the National Science Foundation and a $5 million grant from the Department of Energy for an electric vehicle engineering education and workforce training program.

“These federal stimulus awards will allow our faculty to expand their research in many ways,” said Hilary Ratner, vice president for research at WSU. “It will provide them with the opportunity to grow their research labs by hiring additional research assistants, purchase new equipment to expand the technology currently available, as well as give more undergraduate and graduate students a chance to be a part of the world-class research programs that WSU is engaged in.”

Awards from the National Institutes of Health include:

Robert Akins, Department of Biochemistry
“High Throughput Identification and Quantification of Fungi Using High Resolution Melt Analysis QPCR”
Fungal infections are often life-threatening and their early detection, identification of species and resistance to mutations is crucial to successful intervention. The absence of a commercially available diagnostic modality has been a major deficiency in diagnostic capabilities. This project aims to test and optimize the use of a new tool, high resolution melt analysis, to address these needs. By improving the speed and accuracy of diagnosis of fungi through new methods, morbidity and mortality rates will be improved.

Terrance Albrecht, Karmanos Cancer Institute
“Improving Clinical System Communication to Increase Trial Offers to Cancer Patients”
Cancer clinical trials provide access to the latest cancer treatment available, however, only three percent of all cancer patients participate in clinical trials. This study aims to develop a systems-based intervention to increase the numbers of offers made to patients in order to increase the number of patients enrolling on clinical trial protocols.

Michael Cher, Department of Urology
“The Role of MT1-MMP/RANKL/RANK Axis in Prostate Cancer Bone Metastasis”
Bone metastasis is the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in prostate cancer patients. This proposal will use a variety of biochemical and cellular approaches as well as animal models of bone metastasis to understand the progression of this process.

Dennis Drescher, Department of Otolaryngology
“Identification of Acoustico-Lateralis Transmitters”
This project aims to predict molecular function from the molecular structure of channels and receptors by utilizing microbiochemical methods. The anticipated result is detailed elucidation of structure and molecular function of peripheral neurotransmitter systems of hearing and balance, pointing the way to development of therapies for transmitter-related hearing loss, vertigo and tinnitus.

Alexander Gow, Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics
“Molecular Mechanisms of Neurodegeneration”
This project aims to define and characterize molecular mechanisms by which mutations in proteins cause neurodegenerative disease, such as ALS, Parkinson, Huntington and Alzheimer diseases, and to identify pharmacological agents that improve disease symptoms.

James Granneman, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences
“Analysis of Lipolytic Trafficking in Adipocytes”
The storage and mobilization of lipids are fundamental cellular processes, and their dysregulation contributes to numerous diseases including diabetes, atherosclerosis and cardiomyopathy. The long-term goal of this project is to identify lead compounds for treatment of obesity-related lipotoxicity.

Mark Greenwald, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences
“Human laboratory model of cocaine treatment: Behavioral Economic Analysis"
In this project, ways to control demand for cocaine is studied to help people who are trying to stop using the drug. The effect of environmental conditions and individual differences on the effectiveness of medication to control demand for cocaine is investigated. No anti-cocaine medication will be universally effective because other factors, such as alternatives to drug use (environmental conditions) or individual differences, such as level of cocaine use and severity of withdrawal symptoms, will influence how effective medication is. The results of this study will help develop better treatments for cocaine users.

Mary Lieh-Lai, Department of Pediatrics
“Pediatric Pharmacology Research Unit”
This project will ensure continuation of the Neonatal and Pediatric Pharmacology Research Unit at Children’s Hospital of Michigan and Wayne State University. Multiple projects initiated by this group will advance rational, safe, effective and cost beneficial drug therapies in the fetus, newborns and children for a number of diseases and disorders.

Peter Littrup, Department of Radiology and Karmanos Cancer Institute
“Functional Ultrasound Tomography: Testing a Low-Cost Breast Imaging Concept”
This project will pave the way for functional tomographic imaging, and ultrasound modality that currently does not exist. The clinical implications are immense because functional ultrasound tomography has the potential to provide MRI-like capability at a small fraction of the cost. Such a development would facilitative alternative screening of high risk women, as is now being proposed for MRI. Improved sensitivity to tumors would also pave the way for screening of the general population by overcoming MRI’s cost barrier to universal screening.

Jeffrey Loeb, Department of Neurology
“Activity-Dependent Gene Expression in Human Epilepsy”
Epilepsy is a common neurological disorder affecting up to 1% of the world’s population. It is one of the least understood disorders that can develop after a wide range of brain insults. At present, there are no treatments to prevent epilepsy, and while existing medications reduce seizure frequency, they do not cure the disorder, and often do not work or become ineffective. This project aims to complete preclinical testing that will lead to FDA approval of new drugs to treat patients with epilepsy.

Patricia LoRusso, Karmanos Cancer Institute
“Early Clinical Trials of New Anti-Cancer Agents”
Roughly 500 anti-cancer agents will be available for development within the next decade. The clinical trial community will face significant challenges for making swift and accurate drug development decisions, due to limited resources for continued clinical development as well as potentially unique profiles that the clinical drug candidates may unfold. Together with the University of Maryland’s Greenebaum Cancer Center, the Karmanos Cancer Institute will combine expertise to overcome many of these challenges, allowing for continued development of novel agents for cancer treatment.

Lawrence Lum, Karmanos Cancer Institute
“Breast Cancer Treatment with Antibody Targeted T Cells”
Despite improvements in the treatment of women with breast cancer that has metastasized or spread beyond the initial site, there are no cures. For the 20-25% of women with a particular kind of metastatic breast cancer, a drug called Herceptin in combination with chemotherapy has become a standard treatment. New approaches, however, are needed that will prolong survival for the 75 to 80% of patients who are not eligible for Herceptin. In this project a new treatment that is expected to lead to better outcomes for these women is tested.

Tiffany Mathews, Department of Chemistry
“BDNF, Dopamine and Ethanol”
This project aims to determine if an imbalance between brain derived neurotropic factors (BDNF) and dopamine may lead to abuse of alcohol or protect the brain from expressing biochemical adaptions associated with the addiction process. The impact of this research is to improve our knowledge of the molecular mechanism of alcohol abuse in an effort to develop better treatments and/or therapeutics.

Sylvie Naar-King, Department of Pediatrics
“Multisystemic therapy to reduce health disparities in adolescents with asthma”
This project aims to create an intervention for inner city African American teens with asthma using Multisystemic Therapy, an intensive, home- and community-based psychotherapy. If successful, this intervention will improve asthma management and overall health, as well as reduce healthcare costs for this vulnerable population that is disproportionately affected by asthma.

Melody Neely, Department of Immunology & Microbiology
“Analysis of the Virulence Mechanism of a Lantibiotic Locus”
Streptococcal pathogens are remarkably efficient at causing disease, providing a major challenge to the medical community and an enormous financial burden to our health care system. This project aims to identify how these pathogens have developed ways in which to avoid the immune system during infection. Confirmation of these mechanisms will have direct relevance to human disease and clinical treatment.

Donal O’Leary, Department of Physiology
“Blood Pressure Control During Exercise in Heart Failure”
A feature of ventricular dysfunction is decreased exercise tolerance. Two powerful reflexes exist which are capable of inducing altered cardiovascular responses in subjects with heart failure: the muscle metaboreflex and the arterial baroreflex. This project will study test the functional importance of these two reflexes in heart failure. The project also aims to explore the relationship between coronary blood flow and ventricular function during exercise in heart failure and whether recovery of normal cardiovascular control mechanisms can occur with the recovery from heart failure.

Donal O’Leary, Department of Physiology
“NTS Adenosine Receptors in Cardiovascular Control”
The nucleus tractus solitarius (NTS) is the major integrative center within the brainstem for cardiovascular homeostasis. This project aims to determine the mechanisms mediating the responses to stimulation of NTS adenosine receptor subtypes and the role of these in modulating cardiovascular responses.

Donal O’Leary, Department of Physiology
“Integrative Cardiovascular Control During Exercise in Hypertension”
Hypertension affects nearly one in three adults in the U.S., and is well recognized as a major risk factor for a broad range of cardiovascular diseases such as stroke, congestive heart failure, atherosclerosis, renal disease, and congestive heart failure. Although regular exercise is well known to have a multitude of beneficial effects, in patients with hypertension, abnormally large increases in arterial pressure and heart rate in response to exercise often occur, often at dangerous levels that can cause myocardial infarction and stroke. Little is known about these cardiovascular responses, and this study aims to increase understanding of the role of sensory nerves that respond to changes in metabolite concentration in the active muscles and those that sense changes in blood pressure in mediating the abnormal responses to exercise in hypertension.

Aleksandar Popadic, Department of Biological Sciences
“Genetics of leg size variation in insects”
Understanding the developmental processes by which organisms acquire their final body size is a fundamental biological question. Whereas studies of model organisms such as Drosophila have established general paradigms regarding the control of body growth, virtually nothing is known about the mechanisms that regulate the variation in organ and tissue size that is so prevalent in nature. By examining cellular aspects of differential leg growth, this research will contribute to the understanding of the actual molecular processes underlying variation in organ and tissue growth.

Avraham Raz, Karmanos Cancer Institute
“Characterization of Motility Factor Receptor”
This project aims to gain a better understanding of the molecular mechanisms governing the first step in tumor cell dissemination, namely motility. This project will define the structure-functional relationship and mechanism of action of an autocrine motility factor and its receptor. It is expected that these studies will lead to a better diagnosis, treatment and development of rational therapy for tumor cells.

Melissa Runge-Morris, Institute of Environmental Health Sciences
“PCBS: Environmental Modulators of Human Breast Cancer Progression”
Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are environmental contaminants that have the potential to disrupt important hormonally- responsive pathways in human breast epithelial cells. This project will use a model for human breast cancer progression to understand the role of environmental PCBs in breast cancer development.

Duska Separovic, Department of Occupational & Environmental Health Sciences
“Sphingolipids in Cell Death after Photodamage”
The long-term goal of this project is to augment the efficacy of the cancer treatment photodynamic oxidative stress in a cellular target that can lead to apoptotic cell death.

Michael Shaw, Department of Immunology and Microbiology
“A Novel Splice Variant of Interleukin-13 and its Role in Promoting EAE Responses”
Multiple sclerosis is a human autoimmune disease that afflicts more than 400,000 Americans. EAE is commonly accepted as a suitable animal model for studying the immunopathology of multiple sclerosis. These two diseases share many common characteristics such as clinical manifestations and histopathology of CNS lesions. Knowledge obtained from this study may provide new insight into the development of new therapeutics for MS.

Timothy Stemler, Department of Biochemistry
“Structural Insights into the Function of Frataxin”
Frataxin is a mitochondrial protein known to play a role in regulating cellular iron levels. Reduced levels of frataxin is the principal cause of Friedreich’s ataxia, a neurodegenerative disorder, which affects 1 in 50,000 people. The goal of this project is to distinguish fratazins role in regulating cellular iron homeostasis which will lead to more successful treatment strategies for this disorder.

Paul Stemmer, Institute of Environmental Health Sciences
“A Proposal to Expand Analytical Capabilities at Wayne State University with a 4000 QTrap”
This award will allow for the purchase of an Applied Biosystems 4000 Qtrap hybrid tandem mass spectrometer with nano-LC to efficiently search for protein modifications.

Andrei Tkatchenko, Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology
“Feasibility of a Mouse Model of Myopia”
Myopia continues to be an important health problem with increasing prevalence and high morbidity. This project aims to contribute to the understanding of the pathogenesis of myopia by enabling advanced genetic studies of refractive eye development which are not currently possible.

Jinsheng Zhang, Department of Otolaryngology
“Cortical Electrical Suppression of Noise-Induced Tinnitus”
Tinnitus is a prevalent public health problem that affects millions of people and imposes a significant economic burden to society. This project aims to develop a model of tinnitus suppression through auditory cortex electrical stimulation therapy.

Awards from the National Science Foundation include:

David Coleman, Department of Chemistry
“Acquisition of a Cyber-Enabled 600 MHz NMR Spectrometer for Research and Teaching”
This award will allow for the acquisition of a cyber-enabled 600 MHz nuclear resonance (NMR) spectrometer. It will be used to support research projects of undergraduates, graduate students and postdoctoral researchers.

Zhifeng Huang, Department of Physics & Astronomy
“CAREER: Modeling Nanostructured Systems Outside of Equilibrium”
This CAREER award supports theoretical and computational research integrated with education to study nonequilibrium nanostructured systems with educational activities for undergraduate students as well as for current and future K-12 science teachers. The goal is to improve the understanding of nonequilibrium and nonlinear dynamic processes that occur in nanoscale phases in complex material systems.

Alexey Petrov, Department of Physics & Astronomy
“REU Site: Research Experience for Undergraduates in Astrophysics, Nuclear and Particle Physics”
This project will give WSU students and introduction to the physical, mathematical and computational concepts in leading edge physics topics, as well as a travel component for students to the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center.

Chengzhong Xu, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering
“CSR: Small: A Unified Reinforcement Learning Approach for Autoconfiguration of Virtualized Resources and Appliances”
Cloud computing is an emerging service-oriented computing paradigm. This project will develop a unified learning approach to automate the configuration processes of virtualized machines and applications running on the virtual machines and adapt the systems configuration to the dynamics of cloud. This project will advance discovery and understanding of autonomic management of large-scale complex systems with profound technical, economic and societal impact. It will prepare students to enter the industry with adequate understanding of the challenges and opportunities in cloud computing.

Award from the Department of Energy include:

Simon Ng, Department of Chemical Engineering
“Development and Implementation of a Degree Program in Electric Drive Vehicle Technology”
This project will provide an electric vehicle engineering education and workforce training program.
A critical component of the project is to create a pipeline of next-generation technicians and engineers who are needed by an industry transforming to electric-drive vehicles.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.

Julia Hernandez, research assistant in WSU’s Developmental Disabilities Institute (DDI) and resident of Detroit, received a $210,000 grant from the Michigan Developmental Disabilities Council of the Michigan Department of Community Health for the Supporting Educational Achievement for Minorities (SEAM) project. The project will support and assist a minimum of 20 minority families per year in southwest Detroit in navigating the special education system successfully.

“Studies on special education have found children with disabilities are more successful the less isolated they are from classmates that do not have disabilities,” Hernandez said. “In addition, children more easily translate what they learn in the classroom setting if they aren’t removed from their communities. We’re hoping to use this information to create a better educational experience for children with disabilities in southwest Detroit.”

Like many children across the country, southwest Detroit students with disabilities are sent to schools outside of the community for special education, which can have negative effects. “When students receive a separate education from their peers, it causes feelings of isolation for their parents and the larger community,” said Angela Martin, L.M.S.W., research assistant at the DDI. “It has the same effect as racial or economic segregation.”

Student isolation can become intensified in the largely Hispanic, African American and Arab American community of southwest Detroit, where language and cultural barriers can discourage parents from participating in classroom events outside of their immediate community.

The SEAM project will provide parents of children with disabilities ages 3 to 26 with a better understanding of their student’s educational needs and promising educational practices, such as inclusive education. The training and family support will aid in navigating the children’s education experience toward success and also in designing meaningful transition plans for students older than 14 that support community connections.

Classes will be taught in the native language of the participants, with Hernandez conducting the Spanish portion of the curriculum. The project will encourage parents of students with disabilities to participate in school and community events taking place in southwest Detroit.
“The more students with disabilities are visible in their communities, the more they will be accepted,” Hernandez said. “It will open the door to a more successful education for students with disabilities and allow the community to truly embrace its own diversity.”
The DDI is Michigan’s University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities addressing policy, practice and research in disabilities statewide. For more information about the institute, its projects and activities, visit www.ddi.wayne.edu.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu

For inquiries, contact Amy Oprean at oprean@wayne.edu.

A critical component of the plan is to create a pipeline of next-generation technicians and engineers who are needed by an industry transforming to electric-drive vehicles.

No degree programs in electric-drive vehicles exist in the United States. “The auto manufacturers are training their electric-drive vehicle engineers and technicians mainly in-house,” said Simon Ng, professor, Department of Chemical and Materials Science Engineering. “These components and systems are very much in a state of rapid scientific and technological development that will demand highly trained engineers and technologies with the highest level of technology education.

“I am ecstatic and appreciate the Obama administration’s recognition that education is a vital part of this plan. Specially-skilled engineers are necessary to advance and support electric drive vehicles,” said Ng.

Ng, who directs the university’s Alternative Energy Technology degree program, is leading a team of Wayne State engineering and Macomb Community College faculty, along with NextEnergy of Michigan, to provide a comprehensive set of advanced educational degree programs in electric-drive vehicles, electric transportation technology, and electric vehicle maintenance.

“Our proposed program will be a key component supporting the president’s goal to put one million plug-in hybrid electric vehicles on the road by 2015,” Ng said.

In announcing the grant Wednesday at NextEnergy, a nonprofit “alternative energy accelerator” at TechTown, the university’s research and technology park, Vice President Joe Biden called the Recovery Act awards the “single largest investment” ever in battery technology and manufacturing. According to the plan, Michigan will receive more Recovery Act funds than any other state, creating an estimated 19,000 high-paying jobs.

The proposed Wayne State degree programs include a master’s in Electric-Drive Vehicle Engineering; a bachelor’s in Electric Transportation Technology; an associate’s in Automotive Technology and Electronic Engineering Technology; and a graduate certificate program in Electric-Drive Vehicle Engineering.

There are some 1,000 prospective graduate students and 2,000 prospective undergraduates “locally” eligible for the new degree program, according to Ng. “The distance-learning and Web-based curriculum aspects of the proposal give the educators the potential to reach thousands of more students in the state and across the country, he added.”

Together with Macomb Community College, which has a hybrid electric vehicle maintenance training program, students enrolled in the new program can begin to take courses toward these degree programs beginning in January. 
 

For more information, contact Julie O'Connor - 313-577-8845 or ag2712@wayne.edu.

Song Jiang, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering in the College of Engineering and resident of Troy, Mich., recently received a $400,000 Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program award from the National Science Foundation to develop a more efficient method for quantifying Quality of Service (QoS), a guaranteed level of performance in data flow. The technology will be developed for large IT companies including Microsoft, Google, and Amazon.com, who offer their cloud computing and storage services with their extensive IT infrastructures to organizations looking for more computing power and data storage space.

Although a popular idea, outsource computing and virtual storage services have not developed an efficient method of quantifying hard disk input/output QoS – a parameter needed to predict the price for service. “Hard disks are mechanical, and the information on them is stored much like a record,” Jiang said. “Depending on what information is needed, the time spent locating the information can vary. This inconsistency makes it difficult for companies that outsource their data storage and processing services to specify service quality and set a rate for services.”

To solve the problem, Jiang is proposing the implementation of consolidated storage service based on a reference storage device, which can be the user’s own system. The user is then guaranteed QoS that is as good as their own system, regardless of variations and changes in data access patterns.

Jiang’s research is of high interest to IT giants such as Yahoo!, who use very large scale consolidated storage as an infrastructure for mission critical applications such as Yahoo search engines. For his research, Jiang is receiving technical support from Yahoo! as well as the Performance and Architecture Laboratory at Los Alamos National Laboratory, a United States Department of Energy national laboratory, and Seagate Research, a manufacturer of hard drives and storage solutions.

“As today’s computing relies more and more on efficient and reliable access to large amounts of data, this research has the potential to significantly improve the productivity and efficiency of many IT services,” Jiang said. “It will be important both for mid-size companies outsourcing their computing and virtual storage as well as very large organizations looking to build or expand their own computing facilities.”

Jiang’s research will also serve as a source for virtual data and storage system training for his student assistants and curriculum for WSU computer and electrical engineering students. “We’re excited not only to pave the way for one of the most relevant technologies of the future, but also address the concern for the lack of strong data and storage system professionals in the IT industry.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. www.research.wayne.edu

For more information, contact Julie O'Connor at julie.oconnor@wayne.edu or Amy Oprean at oprean@wayne.edu.

The Wayne State University study was able to confirm that the PAZ organic compound was found to reduce LDL cholesterol levels from 131.7mg/dL to 79.57mg/dL and improve HDL cholesterol from 105.27mg/dL to 138.67mg/dL in test animal subjects. Upon completion of the study, Wayne State will publish a scientific paper describing the final results, as well as the means and methods employed, to be authored by the principal investigator, Smiti Gupta, Ph.D., assistant professor of Nutrition and Food Science at WSU.

The cholesterol findings are initial results of a larger study, which also includes investigating the effect of PAZ organic compounds on the management of generalized inflammation. Those results are pending and will be released as they are completed by WSU.
Gupta commented, “The results show a statistically significant decrease in total plasma cholesterol (TC) and LDL. What was even more interesting was the statistically significant increase in HDL, leading to a marked improvement in the TC/HDL ratio. While these initial findings in the hamster model are exciting and promising, further studies are needed some of which are currently underway.”

"These results mark a turning point in our company’s history as it confirms prior studies and represents an important step forward in identifying the bioactive agents in our PAZ organic compound. Once the study is completed, subject to the identification of the
active molecules, we will begin the process of developing specific commercial applications of the bioactive compounds so that they can be introduced into branded functional foods, supplements, sports drinks and composite nutraceuticals," states John Gorman, the company's sales director. "We are particularly struck by the ability of the PAZ compound to significantly increase HDL levels. This result is considered unique because exercise is considered to be the single best option to raise HDL levels. We will update the investment community with additional benefits as more results become available."

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About Wayne State University
Wayne State University is one of the nation's pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 R&D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. www.research.wayne.edu

About Health Enhancement Products, Inc.
Health Enhancement Products, Inc. is a nutraceutical company engaged in the development of a dietary supplement product using only pure, all-natural ingredients. The Company's premier product is ProAlgaZyme (PAZ), a liquid product drawn from living algae grown in purified water. The water in which the algae is grown is drawn off, filtered and bottled as ProAlgaZyme.

Safe Harbor Statement
Except for any historical information, the matters discussed in this press release contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties. A number of factors could cause actual results to differ from those indicated in the forward-looking statements, including the timing of completion of a trial, actual future clinical trial results being different than the results the company has obtained to date, and the company's ability to secure funding. Such statements are subject to a number of assumptions, risks and uncertainties. Readers are cautioned that such statements are not guarantees of future performance and those actual results or developments may differ materially from those set forth in the forward-looking statements. The company undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information or otherwise.

For more information, please visit http://www.heponline.com.

Contact:
Wayne State University
Julie O'Connor, Director of Research Communications
(313) 577-8845
ag2712@wayne.edu

Health Enhancement Products, Inc.
John Gorman, Director of Sales
(480) 385-3800
john@heponline.com

IR Contact:
Howard Gostfrand/David Sasso
305.918.7000
info@amcapventures.com
www.amcapventures.com

With the launch of a new student program, E2Challenge, WSU is supporting six student teams, with the help of funding from the Michigan Initiative for Innovation & Entrepreneurship, in their efforts to explore the potential of their own start-up company and prepare their ideas for outside investment over the course of the summer.

Twenty-six student teams competed for six slots to receive summer-long mentoring and support for their company ideas. Each selected group is given the opportunity to pursue their own independent start-up company over the summer at TechTown, while receiving substantial guidance and assistance, with each team member receiving $7,500 over the course of the program.

“It is important that we find creative ways to inspire our student body to consider starting their own new ventures as a viable career option,” said Eric Stief, director of Venture Development and the E2Challenge program at WSU. “Typically our graduates focus more on finding traditional employee roles, and do not give new company formation much thought. Plus, many parents try to shy their kids away from an entrepreneurial life right after college because of the great difficulty to get a company off the ground. By giving students a chance to consider an entrepreneurial path before they graduate, we may be able to launch students into career paths they may not have considered otherwise.”

WSU’s goal to retain talent in Michigan and boost our economy may be aided through this extraordinary program. The E2Challenge aims to identify solid entrepreneurial ideas that lead to future startup companies for the State of Michigan and also aims to foster the entrepreneurial spirit on campus. Examples of the E2Challenge projects include:

Couture-Abro Group: Looking for a dream job? Love to travel? The Couture-Abro Group has a plan for you! The group is developing a Web-based firm to offer a new form of marketing in the travel industry.
Through the Web site, TheBigTrip.com, the group will select one candidate to travel and explore various destinations around the United States for three months. The journey will be documented, filmed and aired as mini-episodes on TheBigTrip.com. Each mini-episode will contain interactive links to help common travel consumers with information to aid them in planning their journeys. All this, $50,000 and more! Video resumes are being accepted at http://www.thebigtrip.com!

WD Time Line: WD Time Line will aim to provide commuter and commercial drivers with valuable real-time transit time estimations at critical intersections with a cost-effective and unique telematics platform. The company utilizes both proprietary and publicly available data to provide customers with superior accuracy at lower prices than competitive offerings. The simplicity of WD Time Line alone will appeal to customers of all ages.
The firm intends to focus initially in the southeast Michigan market for its launch in late 2009. The business model is highly scalable however, and the team anticipates multiple site launches in 2010 and beyond. For more information, email wdtimeline@techtown.org.

Team: C.O.O.L.: C.O.O.L. (Creative Online Opportunities for Learning), an online course content provider for the K-12 environment, is developing a flagship product which will be a hybrid online course for ninth-graders. The product aims to improve student self-efficacy and increase student high school graduation rates by motivating the student, building-up learning networks and providing lifelong learning skills. The course will be a combination of face-to-face and online learner-centered activities facilitated by a trained staff member.
A secured social networking interface will allow students to make connections with other C.O.O.L students and serve as the platform to deliver academic and character content. The course will culminate in the creation of an e-portfolio. C.O.O.L. will be available through a subscription service on both an annual and biannual basis. Upgrades and customization also will generate revenues. Individuals, schools, school districts and youth organizations are targeted subscribers to the service. For more information, e-mail happycoolschool@gmail.com.

Team: Qisol: With the rising interest in green energy and the dire economic situation in the United States, Qisol aims to build trust and confidence regarding profitability and green investments in the emerging small-scale solar thermal industry. They plan to accurately and reliably meter, calculate and log the energy produced and efficiency gained from low-temperature, residential, solar thermal domestic hot water preheating installations.
 

Qisol will have a central clearinghouse through wireless networks and SmartGrid technologies, and its flagship product is called ProveYourProfit (PYP). PYP is a physical meter that handles the data necessary to integrate three currently separate business functions: data logging, transmission of ‘third-party’ verified data and subscription reporting.
 

Qisol will verify, package and deliver formatted information that will be beneficial to owners, installers and governmental and private regulating agencies. It will provide information such as return on solar thermal subsides (tax credits), verification that the product is working as intended and remote diagnosis by repair technicians of sub-optimal performance of the solar hot water system. Visit www.qisol.com for more information.

Team: BeeLogic: BeeLogic will provide environmental relations by specializing in analysis, reduction procurements, and the network of quality environmental services and suppliers. BeeLogic's system implements affordable environmental management techniques to satisfy its client base. “Pollination” of business, education and the environment helps to blossom environmentally efficient clients. Using the company’s logic to localize markets reduces the ecological impact and mobilizes business in the community, city and region. BeeLogic's understanding and practice of sustainable living creates transparent relationships by creating a closed loop method that interconnects the consumer and business into environmental relations. For more information, e-mail beelogic@techtownwsu.org.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu

For more information, contact Julie O'Connor at ag2712@wayne.edu or 313-577-8845.

DETROIT—Most solid materials can be neatly divided into two structure systems – crystal or glass. Crystal structures have atoms that fall in to a well-ordered lattice structure, and glass structures have atoms that fall randomly. A team of researchers have discovered that one particular material, Bi₂Ti₂O_7, exhibits unusual characteristics of both glass and crystal. 

According to the researchers, the positively charged nuclei of the material are ordered in a crystalline structure, while the positions of the negatively charged electrons are random. “This mixture of crystalline and glassy behavior has been observed previously in magnetic systems, but the identification of this behavior in Bi2Ti2O7 could confirm a new type of electronic order,” stated Gavin Lawes, Ph.D., assistant professor of physics at Wayne State University and resident of Grosse Pointe Woods, Mich.

Their conclusions, found in the June 2009 issue of Physical Review B by The American Physical Society, are based on evidence that low temperature measurements of the thermodynamic properties of Bi₂Ti₂O₇  is an experimental realization of a “charge ice” system, where the electronic disorder arises because the electrostatic interactions are frustrated by the geometry of the underlying atomic lattice. 

“This result is significant,” commented Lawes, “because the properties of the disordered electrons in a crystalline material may be very different than what is observed in conventional crystalline systems.” This discovery may ultimately lead to new types of technologically important electronic materials.

DETROIT— Wayne State University is pleased to welcome Dr. Joshua Burns who will spend three months at in the School of Medicine as a 2009 Fulbright Postdoctoral Scholar.

CMT is the most common genetic nerve diseases that causes progressive muscle weakness, painful foot deformities and walking difficulty. He will use his Fulbright Postdoctoral Scholarship to initiate long-term collaboration between a unique group of experts who are world leaders in many aspects of clinical and laboratory CMT research.

 “We are extremely happy to have Dr. Burns working with us this summer and fall,” said Shy.  “One of the major challenges in developing treatments for patients with inherited neuropathies is that many of these diseases significantly affect children and young adults. There are few methods in place to evaluate disease progression in these patients and how impairment from the neuropathies alters their quality of life. Dr. Burns, in his young career, has already achieved an international reputation in these areas and his working with our group will accelerate research in these areas throughout the world. We are proud that he sought out our program at WSU to conduct his Fulbright fellowship and look forward to continued international collaborations between our two universities.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. (www.research.wayne.edu)

DETROIT—The Michigan Technology & Research Institute (MITRI), in Ann Arbor, Mich., and Wayne State University have partnered to organize a drug development company based on several neurosciences research platforms from the university’s Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences.

Major depression is a disorder posing significant health problems to a large number of patients worldwide. After cardiovascular disease, depression is considered the second most debilitating disease in the world. “Drug therapies currently on the market for treatment of depression have many shortcomings,” said Dr. Aloke Dutta, professor of pharmaceutical sciences at WSU and inventor of the new technology. “A number of the therapies don’t work in a significant number of patients, and some treatments work at first, but later become ineffective.” 

According to Dutta, currently approved treatments for depression do not address the dopamine component needed to interact with the relevant targets in the brain. The polyfunctional molecules discovered in Dutta’s laboratory interact simultaneously with norepinephrine, serotonin and dopamine systems in the brain, and exhibit activity in animal models that indicate antidepressant activity.

“One of the research goals will be to study whether such novel triple uptake inhibitor molecules have more desirable therapeutic profiles as antidepressant agents compared to the current existing drugs and whether their chronic exposure might sustain effectiveness and lower the incidence of side effects,” said Dutta. 

“The WSU technology platforms integrated in this company have great promise to make a difference in the quality of life of patients with depression and to address unmet medical needs in the neurosciences therapeutic area,” said Dr. David Pegg, MITRI Technical Center president. “The senior scientific researchers at MITRI have many years of experience in strategically taking new drugs to the marketplace, and these drugs have helped improve the lives of people with multiple disease conditions including depression, pain, epilepsy, inflammatory conditions, heart disease and cancer.”

DETROIT—A Wayne State University School of Medicine professor has co-written a new definition and national treatment recommendations for transient ischemic attacks (TIA) or “mini-strokes.” The new guidelines call for much faster intervention treatment for TIA symptoms than previously practiced.

Media Contacts:

Julie O'Connor: julie.oconnor@wayne.edu or 313-577-3626 and Cheryl Yurkovich: cyurkovich@wayne.edu or 313-577-8096

Enter PhinisheD, an unassuming website created by web developer Amy Bellinger in 1997 as a favor to a friend struggling to write a dissertation. Tom discovered it in 1998 and, like a guiding hand in a snowstorm, it pulled him through his writer’s block and back on task. “I won a fellowship, took a year’s leave from work and finished my dissertation.” He also inherited the PhinisheD site in 1999 when Amy was no longer able to run it.

Since then, the simple forum (they prefer Phorum) for grad students to offer support and share ideas has morphed into an elaborate array of links, updates, encouraging messages, celebrations and announcements that gets over 8,000 page views and nearly 1,000 visits per day. Its thousands of users hail from all over the US and Canada, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and dozens of other countries around the world. A 2009 article in The Chronicle of Higher Education commends the PhinisheD site as a safe place to find support and encouragement, a kind of online anti-depressant.

Tom, now Dr. Thomas B. Jankowski, associate director of research for Wayne State’s Institute of Gerontology, has been cited in the acknowledgements of dozens of dissertations with inscriptions like this one: “Thank you, Tom. I couldn’t have finished my Ph.D. without you.” This sentiment, and the 560 members who have completed dissertations or theses with the help of PhinisheD, makes his long labor of love worthwhile. He is the sole webmaster and devotes about 10 hours a week of his free time to its maintenance.

In 2006 the site, which had overgrown its humble architecture, suffered a catastrophic crash. The PhinisheD community protested loud and long that they couldn’t live without it, so Dr. Jankowski scrambled for funds and equipment for a major upgrade. PhinisheD users contributed over $2,000 for software and hardware, a Wayne State colleague gifted him a used server, and Wayne let him plug into their network. It’s been smooth sailing and high growth ever since.

PhinisheD is unique in the academic universe because it charges nothing, displays no advertising, and allows no nastiness. “We’re supportive,” Dr. Jankowski explains. “We’ve even been accused of being sickeningly sweet but that’s okay.” The academic life, while seemingly genteel, has a rough underbelly. Graduate students often complain of feeling isolated, manipulated by competing classmates, sliced by critical professors and generally underappreciated. Some PhinisheD users are first generation college grads whose families don’t understand the stresses of attaining a graduate degree and don’t know how to be supportive. Others feel marginalized due to their race, gender, sexual identity, or perhaps because they are working remotely without an academic community to embrace them.

“The vast majority of PhinisheD users are struggling against writer’s block, procrastination, difficult committee members, departmental politics, and the competitive and hierarchical nature of the university,” according to Dr. Jankowski. “All of these things can gnaw at the self-esteem and impede the progress of the sensitive soul.”

PhinisheD becomes the safe haven in a sometimes harsh academic world. Dr. Jankowski personally checks each new member to the community to protect against infiltration by spammers, trolls, and feral personalities. Members provide strong social policing, too. Phinishers’ culture epitomizes respect, manners, positive feedback and occasional cheerleading. “Many users describe it as a lifeline,” Dr. Jankowski said. “So it can’t have any barbs on it.”

The power of PhinisheD is in the shared experience of its people who speak honestly and openly about their situation. “Over and over we hear members say, ‘If I could do it, so can you,” Dr. Jankowski says. “You are not alone.”

Learn about PhinisheD firsthand by visiting www.phinished.org. You must register to access all sections of the site, but usage is free.
 

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world.

For more information, contact Cheryl Deep at 313-577-2297 or cheryldeep@aol.com.

Caisheng Wang, Ph.D., assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering and engineering technology in the College of Engineering and resident of Detroit, Mich., received a $311,334 grant from the National Science Foundation to develop a control strategy for using both traditional power plant-generated electricity and alternative energy distributed generation (AEDG) sources including wind turbines, solar panels and fuel cells.

AEDG sources, which could be standard features of smart homes of the future, can generate power on their own for individual homes or as part of a larger network connected by a grid. If utilized efficiently, their integration into the larger power system could bring about vital improvements to the current power system.

“Integrating old and new energy sources into one system is challenging, because the current energy infrastructure was not designed for these small, additional power sources,” Wang said. “Yet, if we can develop strategies for managing them together, it will create opportunities for both efficiency and reliability that we’ve never seen before.”

The potential to improve energy efficiency stems from the fact that whenever a home increases or decreases its energy demand – by turning on the washer, or turning off lights, for example – some energy is lost. Additional power sources, such as fuel cells, can absorb these oscillations, making the home’s demand on power plant- generated energy steadier – in turn wasting less power. “By the time energy generated in a power plant reaches an individual home in the current system, 9 percent of the energy is lost,” Wang said. “If we can decrease that loss by 1 percent, it would be equivalent to needing 15 less coal-fired power plants in the U.S. over the next 20 years.

AEDG integration may also make blackouts less likely, because alternative energy sources can provide back-up support to large-scale power grids. In the current system, if a glitch occurs in a power plant, the plant will automatically disconnect itself from the power grid. That void in energy generation, however, puts an additional load on the remaining power plants supporting the grid, which can lead to large-scale malfunction. By controlling AEDG sources to supply power to the grid when needed, however, blackouts may be avoided.

Wang is modeling his control strategy to include several facets, including coordinating multiple energy sources to optimize efficiency, energy storage and even prediction programs for upcoming shortages or surpluses in energy supply. He will test the strategies using computer simulation studies, and later, using a microgrid that will power the WSU engineering technology building. “If we can successfully manage the power with this microgrid, we’ll know we’re on the right track to extending the strategy to the larger system where it is greatly needed,” Wang said.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world.

For more information, contact Amy Oprean at oprean@wayne.edu,

Eugene P. Schoener, Ph.D., professor of pharmacology and psychiatry and behavioral neurosciences in WSU’s School of Medicine and resident of Farmington Hills, Mich., received a $250,000 grant from the Flinn Foundation to determine the effectiveness of combined Motivational Interviewing (MI), Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and substance abuse treatment on the recovery of patients with severe mental illness and substance abuse problems. The study will take place at Kadima, a non-profit mental health services agency with Jewish roots based in Southfield, Mich.

“MI and CBT are complementary approaches based on the notion that patients have to own and resolve their own problems,” Schoener said. “MI helps the individual appreciate the nature of their problem and develop the motivation to change their behavior, and CBT provides a comprehensive set of tools to do it. We’re hoping that these two elements, along with the knowledge and skills of treating substance abuse will help to promote not just clinician skill levels, but actually change the way Kadima delivers services.”

Previous studies strongly suggest that both MI and CBT are highly effective for a wide range of mental illnesses including substance abuse. However, most studies were conducted in laboratory settings and addressed the problems separately. Schoener’s study offers the opportunity to observe the influence of MI and CBT when treating mental illness and substance abuse concurrently in a real-life setting.
“About 60 percent of patients with severe mental illness have a co-occurring substance abuse problem,” Schoener said. “If you don’t deal with both problems concurrently, one disorder can sabotage progress made with the other. Our combined therapy approach is designed to address the reality of all these problems together, the way they occur in the real world.”

MI is a non-judgmental, non-confrontational method of engaging patient motivation to change their thoughts and behavior. Past studies have shown that MI builds a greater sense of trust and a stronger overall alliance between therapist and client and redefines the patient as having a more active role in their recovery. “This isn’t the clinician giving the patient a pep talk; in fact it’s just the opposite,” Schoener said. “It’s eliciting the motivation within that person. The therapist is no longer there to “fix” somebody, but rather to facilitate and assist the client in achieving their best.”

CBT is a goal-oriented, systematic approach in which patients work to identify the underlying causes for dysfunctional thoughts, feelings or behaviors then restructure their thoughts to be healthier and more productive. Shown to be effective in the treatment of mood disorders, anxiety disorders, personality disorders, substance abuse disorders, and psychotic disorders, CBT requires focused and deliberate participation of the patient. “It’s not simply meeting every week to chat. There is homework involved, and patients really have to work at it. The reward for all their hard work, however, is being far better equipped to maintain wellness, undertake new challenges and achieve more in their lives.”

The study will be based around clinicians and their patients at Kadima, a prominent mental health provider for more than 25 years with a heavily empirical, best practice approach to therapy. Schoener will study whether the clinician’s MI, CBT and substance abuse training significantly enhances their patients’ recovery. Evaluation techniques will include patient and clinician assessments, session monitoring and standardized measures of program performance, such as number of patient hospital visits and patient retention.
 

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world.

For additional information, contact Amy Oprean at oprean@wayne.edu.

Jeffrey Kuentzel, Ph.D., clinical assistant professor of psychology in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and resident of Dearborn, Mich., received the award for the Wayne State University Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) Program, a service he directs at the WSU Psychology Clinic that provides treatment to people with severe problems with regulation of emotions and behavior as seen in Borderline Personality Disorder.

The grant will enable the program, which has been at maximum capacity for the last year and has a growing waiting list, to triple its client capacity. It will also provide compensation to several part-time graduate students, provide formal training for 10 students and fund the DBT Family group, a support/education group for loved ones of persons with the disorder.

Borderline Personality Disorder is a longstanding and pervasive pattern of serious social and behavioral difficulties associated with severe emotion dysregulation. Its prevalence has been estimated at approximately 1 to 2 percent of the population in the United States. Hallmarks of the disorder include recurring crises, psychiatric hospitalizations, self-harm, suicidal behaviors, addictions, impulsivity and episodes of depression and anxiety.

Considered by experts to be one of the few empirically validated treatments for the disorder, DBT combines standard cognitive-behavioral techniques for emotion regulation and reality-testing with concepts of mindful awareness, distress tolerance and acceptance. DBT has been demonstrated in several controlled trials over the past 15 years to significantly reduce suicidal behaviors, increase therapy attendance and decrease hospitalizations.

The WSU DBT program does not allow low income to be a barrier to clients in need of treatment. However, this had prevented the program’s student clinicians from receiving compensation. “Our grad students take on the bulk of the program’s work, but until recently were working on a volunteer basis,” Kuentzel said. “With their busy class schedules, research and other jobs, their time spent with this program speaks very highly of their dedication to being successful future clinicians. The Flinn Foundation grant will allow us to support such valuable work.”

With continued support, Kuentzel, along with collaborators Douglas Barnett, Ph.D., associate professor of psychology and director of the WSU Psychology Clinic, Diane Chugani, Ph.D., professor of pediatrics and radiology and Eric Pihlgren, Ph.D., a licensed psychologist based in Birmingham, Mich., hope to continue providing high quality DBT services to an expanded number of clients regardless of income and provide expert training to future mental health professionals. In addition, they plan to implement rigorous assessment of clients’ progress over the course of treatment. After six months of treatment, Kuentzel expects more than half of the program’s clients will experience reductions in the severity of Borderline Personality Disorder, as determined by psychological testing and questionnaires. After 12 months, he expects more than half of clients will fall in the normal range on the same assessments.

“By developing sustainable financial support for the Wayne State DBT program, we will be able to continue our mission to provide future mental health care professionals with superior training for treating this prevalent disorder and ensure that those who cannot afford costly mental health treatments are not denied the opportunity to create what DBT refers to as ‘a life worth living’,” Kuentzel said.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world.

For more information, contact Amy Oprean at (313) 577-1494 or oprean@wayne.edu.

Stephanie Brock, Ph.D., associate professor of chemistry in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, received $79,529 from the National Science Foundation Division of Chemistry for a project for which she is a co-investigator. Along with the project’s principal investigator Mark Bussell, Ph.D., of Western Washington University, Brock is working to modify the process in which sulfur is removed from crude oil – a vital step in turning oil into usable fuel.

The study will test the potential of metal phosphides as catalysts – substances that initiate a chemical process – with the goal of removing more sulfur from crude oil than is possible with current methods.

The process traditionally uses sulfide catalysts, which have been known to become “deactivated” over time, removing less and less sulfur from the crude oil until they stop completely. Brock said metal phosphides may be an ideal alternative. “What we’d like to have is a catalyst with a greater consistency and a longer lifetime,” she said. “Metal phosphides are more resistant than conventional sulfides to losing their functionality. They also seem to have a higher rate of activity and can remove more sulfur overall.”

If successful, this research could lead to gasoline that releases lower quantities of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide, both toxic substances, and will enable the U.S. to meet the Environmental Protection Agency’s mandate for lower emissions for both gases.
 

Metal phosphides’ high catalyst potential may also prove useful for developing a refining process rigorous enough and economically viable for use on North American crude oil sources, which have greater impurities than Middle Eastern sources and are more difficult to refine. “Sulfur is one of several impurities that are more abundant in North American oil sources than that of places like Saudi Arabia,” Brock said. “If metal phosphide catalysts are shown to remove a larger amount of sulfur from a more impure source, we would be significantly closer to independence from foreign oil.”

Although advancing technologies such as solar and hydrogen power are making headway as viable forms of energy, Brock’s research could result in more immediate solutions to the country’s most pressing energy issues. “I think it’s understood that we’re going to continue to need fossil fuels for transportation, at least in the short term,” Brock said. “Because of this, it’s very important that we develop solutions to problems of the current system – meeting environmental regulations, and addressing the energy security issues – while other alternatives are still being developed.”

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world.

Release Date: April 16, 2009
Contact: Amy Oprean
Voice: (313) 577-1494
E-mail: oprean@wayne.edu
Fax: (313) 577-3626
 

The program, now in its third year of supporting the arts, funded all seven projects that were invited to submit full proposals. They include:

David Rosenberg, M.D., the Miriam L. Hamburger Endowed Chair of Child Psychiatry and professor of psychiatry in the School of Medicine at Wayne State University, collaborated with researchers at the University of Michigan, Children's Hospital of Michigan and University of Toronto/Hospital for Sick Kids. This international team discovered that the chemical, glutamate, plays a key role in children with OCD.

OCD is a debilitating neuropsychiatric condition that affects approximately 1 to 3 percent of the population worldwide. As many as 80 percent of all OCD cases begin in childhood and adolescence. In Rosenberg’s study, children with OCD had abnormal glutamate levels in key brain regions which were reversible with effective treatment.

“Since our initial findings at Wayne State University, basic neuroscience, genetic, brain imaging and novel treatment development studies all converged to show that glutamate has a key role in OCD,” said Rosenberg. “If we think of serotonin as analogous to light that lets us see in the dark, glutamate is the brain's light switch or brain modulator which helps turn serotonin and other chemicals off and on.”

Wayne State’s researchers along with Gregory Hanna, M.D. of the University of Michigan and researchers at the University of Toronto/Hospital for Sick Kids in Toronto, Ontario have a longstanding collaboration and recently published the first OCD study combining brain imaging and genetics studies in the same children with OCD in the March 2009 issue of the journal Brain Imaging and Behavior. All brain images and blood samples were collected at Wayne State with blood samples genetically analyzed – in Drs. James Kennedy and Paul Arnold’s laboratory at the University of Toronto and Hospital for Sick Kids.

The studies found significant associations between glutamate receptor and transporter genes and abnormal brain volumes in brain regions implicated in OCD such as the thalamus ('grand central station' in the brain), caudate nucleus (brain's secretary), anterior cingulate cortex (brain's arousal center) and orbital prefrontal cortex (brain's executive decision maker).

This work showing glutamate abnormalities in OCD has significant treatment implications. Based in part on initial findings at Wayne State showing glutamate abnormalities in OCD, new treatment approaches using glutamate modulator drugs such as riluzole, which is currently used for treating Lou Gehring’s disease, and others have been used in adults and children with OCD. Initial studies have shown great promise, and studies using riluzole are currently being conducted by the National Institute of Mental Health in children with OCD. The trial is ongoing and results are currently unavailable.

“This study at NIMH demonstrates how work first done at Wayne State University not only has scientific implications but has key 'translational' relevance in bringing work from the bench to the bedside with potential clinical ramifications,” commented Rosenberg. Wayne State University, the University of Michigan and the University of Toronto/Hospital for Sick Kids in Toronto have recently submitted a Collaborative R01 grant to NIMH which is being considered for funding. Wayne State University is the lead site and coordinating center on this application.

To view the full paper, visit here.

A second paper was recently published online and will be available in the May issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging by the same team of researchers. This paper continues the team’s study of pediatric OCD patients is the first published report examining the relationship between genetic variation and a neurochemical phenotype in OCD. This study found that there is a significant association between variation in a key glutamate receptor gene and glutamate levels in the brain’s arousal center, the anterior cingulate cortex. No association was found between genetic markers and brain imaging measures in brain regions not implicated in the pathology of OCD.

To view the full paper, visit here.

Along with Rosenberg, collaborators on the projects include Frank P. MacMaster, Yousha Mirza , Phillip Easter, and Michelle Rose of Wayne State University and The Children’s Hospital of Michigan; Gregory Hanna, University of Michigan; Paul Daniel Arnold, Hospital of Sick Kids and the University of Toronto; and Margaret A. Richter, Tricia Sicard, Eliza Burroughs and James Kennedy, University of Toronto.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world.

For more information, contact:
Julie O'Connor
Director of Research Communications
Office of the Vice President for Research
Wayne State University
5057 Woodward, Suite 6409
Detroit, MI 48202
julie.oconnor@wayne.edu
(313) 577-8845
http://www.research.wayne.edu
 

Blast injuries caused by improvised explosive devices make up about 80 percent of injuries to U.S. troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, and have earned the title ‘the signature injury’ of these wars. Soldiers often experience symptoms of mild TBI after exposure to only blast waves – the high amplitude pressure waves emitted from an explosive – even while they are out of range of the bomb’s wind, shrapnel and fireball. Symptoms of mild TBI include memory loss, confusion, speech problems, difficulty with decision making, headaches, poor attention and loss of concentration.

Zhang is part of a distinguished group of researchers investigating the effects of blast waves on the human head and brain in the effort to uncover how TBI is caused and how it can be prevented. Zhang is using a “finite element” computer model of the human head she created to understand underlying damaging pathways of pressure waves as they travel through the skull and different tissues in the brain.
It has been postulated that mild TBI occurs because blast waves travel unevenly through different brain tissues, leading to stress concentrations in certain areas of the brain. Understanding these concentrations will help Zhang locate the first point of injury when a blast wave hits, as well as the location and type of other injuries that follow. This knowledge will be instrumental in designing helmets to prevent mild TBI from happening.

“Our goal is to create a model of blast injury that can predict initial brain damage and subsequent cellular damage and apply the knowledge to improving the design of protective devices,” Zhang said. “Ultimately, we’d like to find a way to prevent these injuries from happening. Prevention is always better than treatment, when it’s possible.”

Another goal of the research is to determine the threshold of overpressure at which injury first appears in the human brain. From there, Zhang’s lab will establish a dose-effect relationship – or the degree of injury caused by overpressure of varied intensities and duration. This information can be used to assess the risk level for brain injury on the battlefield based on the amount of overpressure to which soldiers are being exposed.

It is hoped that this proactive approach to mild traumatic brain injury, in both preventative measures and risk assessment will, in the future, relieve soldiers from one of the damaging results of modern day war. “The long-term effects of traumatic brain injury are devastating, and even mild TBI has long-term, life-altering consequences,” Zhang said. “We’d like to be part of the solution that will lift some of the grief, both financially and emotionally, that TBI puts on both families and society.”
 

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Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting, ranking in the top 50 in R & D expenditures of all public universities by the National Science Foundation. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world.