Emilyn Alejandro, PhD / Victor Barocas, PhD
"Murine aortic wall changes due to hyperglycemia with and without rescue of glycemic control"

Diabetes and hyperglycemia are associated with hypertension and increased arterial stiffness, a significant risk factor for heart disease. Importantly, arterial compliance can be partially restored following restoration of glycemic control, but the mechanism by which elevated and managed glucose levels modulate vascular mechanics remains unclear. Weaving together their expertise, the laboratories of Dr. Emilyn Alejandro, Associate Professor in IBP with  expertise in diabetes research, and Dr. Victor Barocas, Professor in Biomedical Engineering with expertise on soft tissue mechanics, will work together on determining the effects of induced diabetes and the resulting hyperglycemia on aortic structure and function. They are very grateful for the support of LHI that creates the opportunity to combine their different backgrounds to conduct this research and to generate key preliminary data for NIH funding.

John Collister, DVM, PhD / Marc Jenkins, PhD
"Role of Brain-Sympathetic-Gut Microbiome Axis in Hypertension"

Hypertension affects nearly 700 million people worldwide and changes in the balance and composition of microbiota in fecal samples suggest a role for the gut microbiome in certain forms of hypertension. In this application, we will utilize the well-established angtiotensin II rodent model of hypertension, to explore the role of the GI microbiome in hypertension. This model has a neurogenic component and we hypothesize that an OVLT-sympathetic-gut (OSG) microbiome axis is required for the development of hypertension. This will be accomplished by comparing blood pressure and GI microbiome responses to chronic AngII treatment in control rats to those with OVLT lesions or celiac ganglionectomy. Dr. Collister’s lab will conduct the chronic hypertensive rodent experiments, as well as collection of gut tissues for microbiome analysis and additional profiling of lymphocytes and cytokine analyses by Dr. Jenkin’s lab. With gratitude to the LHI, these data will provide several converging lines of evidence that the brain in tandem with the composition of GI microbiota, its metabolites, and subsequent inflammatory mediators contributes to hypertension, therefore providing the necessary preliminary data for future extramural grant submissions to both the NIH and American Heart Association.