Request for Funding
Medical Student Research Fellowship for Summer 2011

All descriptions must contain enough detail to permit an assessment of the problem that is to be addressed and the methodologies that are to be employed. Please be careful to outline the role that the student will play in the project that is described. Please ensure that all relevant approval numbers (IRB, IACUC) are provided.

Mentor:           Shusheng Wang       
Department:    Ophthalmology        
Room number: E7. 504       
Mail Code:     9057  
Phone number: 8-4732       
E-mail: shusheng.wang@utsouthwestern.edu      
           
Project 1:

Project title:    Functional study of microRNAs in vascular retinopathy   

Human subjects IRB approved project number (where applicable):      

Animal subjects IRB approved project number (where applicable):      

Project Type (patient-based research, animal-based research, or basic research; this characterization is only to permit a general classification for grouping similar types of projects)

Basic Research

Brief Description of Project:

Pathological angiogenesis in the eye is the most common cause of blindness at all ages and underlies conditions such as retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) in children, diabetic retinopathy in young adults and age-related macular degeneration (AMD) in the elderly. The long-term plan for my lab is to decipher the molecular mechanisms of angiogenesis at post-transcriptional level, with a goal of finding a therapeutic solution for vascular retinopathy. We have a list of candidate microRNAs which may have potential function in angiogenesis and vascular retinopathy. With the help of the PI and the postdocs in the lab, the potential summer student will test their function in angiogenesis using in vitro cell culture models and in vivo mouse models.  Shown below is the detailed experiment plan:

(1). microRNA transfection into cells or cultured dorsal aortas;
(2). Real-time PCR to confirm the efficiency of knockdown or overexpression of individual microRNAs;
(3). Observe and grade vascular structure formation in cells cultured on the Matrigel;
(4). Observe and grade the sprouting angiogenesis of the aortas cultured on the Matrigel;
(5). Corneal angiogenesis assay to evaluate the function of candidate microRNAs in angiogenesis in vivo.

Project 2:

Project title:    Identification of plasma microRNA biomarkers for Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and Diabetic retinopathy.

Human subjects IRB approved project number (where applicable):      

Animal subjects IRB approved project number (where applicable):      

Project Type (patient-based research, animal-based research, or basic research; this characterization is only to permit a general classification for grouping similar types of projects)

Patient-based Research

Brief Description of Project:

The goal for the project is to identify microRNA biomarker for AMD and DR. This ongoing project  is in collaboration with Drs. Yuguang He and Rafael Ufret-Vincenty in our department. W have obtained the patients plasma and in the process of screening for microRNA markers for AMD and DR. The potential summer student will perform experiments to confirm our initial screening by microRNA real-time PCR, and possibly to study the function of the candidate microRNAs from the screening. Details of the projects are shown as below:

(1).Organize and analyze patient information;
(2). Collect plasma and serum samples from the patients (half done already);
(3). Isolate plasma and serum microRNAs from the patients;
(4). Group patient microRNAs based on the disease stages, and perform real-time PCR screening using a 384 well plate format;
(5). Data analysis and candidate microRNA selection (to find the most upregulated and downregulated microRNAs in the patients);
(6). Confirmation of up- or down-regulation of candidate miRNAs using individual patient samples.