CONTACT: Lisa Hildebrand
(608) 890-8490
The Wisconsin Partnership Program at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health recently awarded four Collaborative Health Science grants totaling nearly $2 million. Projects will focus on cancers caused by the human papillomavirus (HPV), asthma treatment, blastomycosis infection and vitamin D deficiency.
The Partnership Program’s competitive Collaborative Health Sciences Program supports novel ideas and interdisciplinary approaches to research and education benefiting the health of Wisconsin residents.
HPV-associated cancers
Dr. Paul Lambert received a three-year grant of $500,000 to identify treatments that improve outcomes for patients with cervical, head or neck cancers caused by the human papillomavirus (HPV).
Current treatments for these types of cancers rely on decades-old approaches and are associated with high rates of recurrence and poor survival.
Lambert, chair of the department of oncology and the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research, is internationally renowned for his work investigating the role of HPV in cancer. He will work with Dr. Randall Kimple, an assistant professor of human oncology, and David Beebe, a professor of biomedical engineering.
While HPV vaccines hold promise in preventing new infections, there is an urgent need for improved treatment for those people already infected with HPV. About 20 million people in the United States are infected with HPV, although most do not know they have it. It is estimated that 6 million more people will get infected each year.
The researchers also seek to identify which of these new-generation cancer drugs will work best for an individual patient.
Personalized asthma treatment
Dr. Xin Sun, professor of medical genetics, received a three-year, $500,000 grant to study the genomic variations that contribute to the development of asthma in children. In Wisconsin, 12 percent of adults and 11 percent of children have been diagnosed with asthma. The incidence is higher in obese individuals and the underserved African-American population. Children younger than 5 are the most affected.
The project builds on findings from the Childhood Origins of Asthma (COAST) study at the UW School of Medicine and Public Health, one of the largest and longest-running asthma birth-cohort studies in the country. COAST study leaders Dr. Robert Lemanske and Dr. James Gern, professors of pediatrics and medicine, are co-principal investigators on this study.
The researchers will study candidate asthma genomic regions implicated in genome-wide association studies and identify from them asthma-causal genes. Their findings will serve to establish a Wisconsin Childhood Asthma Gene-Presentation Registry, which will help predict disease development and personalized response to drug treatments.
Fungal-infection susceptibility
Dr. Bruce Klein, professor of pediatrics and infectious disease, received a $500,000 grant over three years to study blastomycosis infection among Hmong-ancestry populations, which have a sharply elevated incidence of the disease. Blastomycosis is caused by a soil fungus, and the infection can lead to respiratory failure and neurological damage.
Dr. Caitlin Pepperell, assistant professor of medicine, and other members of the interdisciplinary team will study the role of immune-response genes in altering infection susceptibility. Researchers also hope to learn how genetic variation affects vulnerability to blastomycosis infection.
Beyond broad geographic patterns in incidence, it is not possible to identify people at risk of developing the disease. It is difficult to isolate the fungus from the environment, and individual variation in susceptibility isn’t understood.
Personalized vitamin-D supplementation
Dr. Corinne Engelman, associate professor of population health sciences, received a $499,997 grant over three years to validate an algorithm for personalizing vitamin D deficiency treatment. Engelman and colleagues developed the algorithm to address the wide variation in biological response to fixed-dose supplementation.
Dr. Neil Binkley, director of the UW Osteoporosis Clinical Center and Research Program and associate director of the UW Institute on Aging, and Dr. Robert Blank of the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) will work with Dr. Engelman to test and refine the algorithm by examining several factors that likely contribute to the variability in response to vitamin D supplementation. Dr. Blank is chief of the Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Clinical Nutrition at MCW.
Because of differences in bone and vitamin D metabolism between women of European descent and those of African descent, the researchers seek to validate the algorithm in two independent samples of post-menopausal women. The algorithm also will allow the researchers to advance personalized clinical care by estimating the vitamin D dosage needed to achieve the targeted blood concentration.
About the Wisconsin Partnership Program
The Wisconsin Partnership Program represents a far-reaching commitment by the UW School of Medicine and Public Health to improve the health and well-being of Wisconsin residents through investments in research, education and community-academic partnerships. The Partnership Program was created with funds from the conversion of Blue Cross & Blue Shield United of Wisconsin to a for-profit corporation.
