CLEVELAND, March 30 /PRNewswire/ -- Cleveland Clinic Lerner Research Institute has received a $13.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to study the molecular causes of blood clots, key contributors to heart attacks and stroke.
The Lerner Research Institute is one of only three institutions nationwide to receive funding from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, part of the NIH, to develop a Center for Thrombosis Research. The five-year Specialized Center for Clinically Oriented Research (SCCOR) grant was received by a research team led by Roy Silverstein, M.D., Chairman of the Department of Cell Biology and Vice Chairman of Translational Research at the Clinic’s Lerner Research Institute. Dr. Silverstein will be the Center’s principal investigator.
“Arterial thrombosis, or blood clots, is the leading cause of heart attacks and stroke,” Dr. Silverstein said. “This big, multi-investigator award is a significant investment and validation of leading-edge research at the Clinic into the factors that contribute to the formation of blood clots and ultimately life-threatening events like heart attacks and strokes. What we learn by way of this grant could benefit patients for years to come.”
Cleveland Clinic investigators will collaborate with researchers at Case Western Reserve University in the Center for Thrombosis Research to study the cellular and genetic causes of arterial thrombosis, or blood clots.
“This Center is another example of how our strong collaborations among our laboratory researchers and clinical investigators at Cleveland Clinic, Case and University Hospitals have resulted in a highly competitive national award coming to Cleveland,” said Paul E. DiCorleto, Ph.D., Chairman of the Lerner Research Institute.
The grant will fund five separate research projects and will support the Research Core Services at the Lerner Research Institute, providing centralized services for genetics, statistics, cell and molecular analysis, and clinical research.
“During the last 30 years, we’ve learned a lot about thrombosis and how blood platelets function and how proteins assemble to form clots,” Dr. Silverstein said. “This program intends to build on that knowledge to translate laboratory-based discoveries to clinical relevance. Connecting laboratory and clinical research on arterial thrombosis makes this a unique research enterprise.”
In addition to Dr. Silverstein, the other project leaders are Edward Plow, Ph.D., Chairman of the Lerner Research Institute’s Department of Molecular Cardiology; Thomas McIntyre, Ph.D., Staff in the Clinic’s Department of Cell Biology; Kandice Marchant, M.D., Staff in the Clinic’s Department of Laboratory Medicine; Eric Topol, M.D., Professor of Genetics at the Case School of Medicine; and Keith McCrae, M.D., Associate Professor of Medicine at the Case School of Medicine.
Leading the Research Core Services are Qing Wang, Ph.D., of the Lerner Research Institute’s Department of Molecular Cardiology; John Barnard, Ph.D., of Cleveland Clinic Quantitative Health Sciences; Gary Francis, M.D., of the Clinic’s Department of Cardiovascular Medicine; and Clemencia Colmenares, Ph.D., Co-Director, Research Core Services at the Lerner Research Institute.
Dr. Silverstein anticipates the need to hire technical staff and postdoctoral fellows to assist with the research.
The Lerner Research Institute is home to all laboratory-based research at The Cleveland Clinic Foundation. Its mission is to understand the causes of human diseases and to develop new treatments and cures. The Lerner Research Institute is ranked fifth in NIH funding among all U.S. research institutes in 2004. More than 1,100 people work in research programs focusing on cardiovascular, cancer, neurologic, musculoskeletal, allergic and immunologic, eye, metabolic, and infectious disease. The Institute also is an integral part of the new Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University -- training the next generation of physician-scientists.
Cleveland Clinic, located in Cleveland, Ohio, is a not-for-profit multispecialty academic medical center that integrates clinical and hospital care with research and education. Cleveland Clinic was founded in 1921 by four renowned physicians with a vision of providing outstanding patient care based upon the principles of cooperation, compassion and innovation. U.S. News & World Report consistently names Cleveland Clinic as one of the nation’s best hospitals in its annual “America’s Best Hospitals” survey. Approximately 1,500 full-time salaried physicians at Cleveland Clinic and Cleveland Clinic Florida represent more than 100 medical specialties and subspecialties. In 2005, 2.7 million patients came for treatment from every state and 100 countries. Cleveland Clinic website address is http://www.clevelandclinic.org.
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