March 6, 2020, NIH Record, Vol. LXXII, No. 5
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March 6, 2020 Vol. LXXII, No. 5 amino acid that has gone awry and typically results in 30 years less life expectancy for those who have it, said Barabino. Cases of SCD are predicted to rise by 30 percent Barabino Sorts Out Mechanics between 2010 and 2050, she added. of Sickle Cell Disease Normal red blood cells are like the fittest BY RICH MCMANUS person at your gym, the one who is endlessly strong and flexible. Traffic jams are bad enough—remember “The red blood cell is a marvel in both the mass campus exit during Jan. 7’s structure and function,” said Barabino, who snow?—but what if they occurred in blood directs CCNY’s Laboratory on Vascular and vessels throughout the organs of your Orthopedic Tissue Engineering Research. “It body, from the eyes, to the liver, to the gall has a bi-concave discoidal shape that permits bladder, on down? the membrane to deform while maintaining That is what sickle cell crisis inflicts on a constant surface area without stretching. the millions of people worldwide who have Its flexible dumbbell shape allows it to pass sickle cell disease (SCD), including some Dr. Gilda Barabino accepts honorary plaque through vessels with a diameter half the size 100,000 Americans, said Dr. Gilda Barabino, from NIH principal deputy director Dr. of the red blood cell itself.” dean of engineering at the City College of Lawrence Tabak, who introduced her lecture. “It’s not often that one can introduce a WALS But in SCD, red blood cells become New York, at a Jan. 28 talk in the Wednesday lecturer who is a dean at their alma mater [City deformed in low-oxygen conditions and Afternoon Lecture Series. College of New York],” he said. adopt a sickle shape, their once-flexible SCD is a painful disease caused by a single PHOTO: DR. MARIE A. BERNARD SEE SICKLE CELL, PAGE 4 Potential Treatment Found for NEW NEUROTECHNOLOGIES Alcoholic Liver Disease Shanechi Explores How to BY ERIC BOCK Decode Mood An anti-inflammatory called hyaluronic BY DANA TALESNIK acid 35 (HA 35) might one day protect Sometimes it seems almost unpredict- patients from the able. Our mood is often affected by many complications of conditions and moderate alco- variables. Could it holic liver disease, really be possible Puppies provide therapy for doctors as well as said Dr. Laura to predict and patients. See story, p. 12 Nagy at NIAAA’s control our 24th annual Mark ALSO THIS ISSUE mental state? Keller Honorary Such a prospect Upcoming WALS Talks Feature Nobelist Lecture in Lipsett could bring relief Allison, Dyer Speaker Cooper .............3 Amphitheater on to the many REAL ID Act Gets Real Here on Oct. 1 ........5 Jan. 28. who suffer from “We’re in the New Deputy Director for NIMHD ............7 neuropsychiatric planning stage Dr. Laura Nagy disorders, includ- Flint Water Scientist To Lecture at NIH ........8 Dr. Maryam Shanechi for conducting a ing the millions Digest ....................................9 pilot clinical trial, to see whether providing of people in the United States who have HA 35 to healthy adults before a single Milestones ...............................10 treatment-resistant major depression. alcoholic drink can protect the gut,” said Dr. Maryam Shanechi is pioneering work Seen ....................................12 SEE NAGY, PAGE 8 SEE SHANECHI, PAGE 6 BRIEFS Scholarly Publishing Mar. 18 NIDA Director Receives AMA’s Davis Award Symposium: Elevate Your Research Visibility NIDA director Dr. Nora Volkow received the American Medical Association’s 2020 The NIH Library will host a Scholarly Publishing Dr. Nathan Davis Award for Outstanding Symposium on Wednesday, Mar. 18 from 9 a.m. to Government Service in the category Member noon in Lipsett Amphitheater, Bldg. 10. of Executive Branch in Career Public Service. Experts will share their insights and advice on how Recognizing Volkow’s dedication to public you can make your research more visible. Topics service, the award is considered one of the include Author Identifiers That Improve Research most prestigious that honors local, state and Visibility (Laure Haak, executive director of ORCID); federal career and elected officials. Volkow Preprints: Pros and Cons (John R. Inglis, executive was recognized for her contributions to the director of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press field of addiction research. As one of the and bioRxiv co-founder, and Pritty Joshi, NIH health world’s leading experts on the science of science policy analyst); and Social Media: How to addiction, she pioneered the use of brain Increase Research Visibility (César Berrios-Otero, imaging to investigate the toxic effects and JoVE representative and Jennifer Dorsey, NCI social properties of drugs of abuse. NIDA director Dr. Nora Volkow (c) holds her award media coordinator). in the company of ABC News reporter Deborah The award ceremony, held Feb. 11 at Roberts and AMA board chair Dr. Jesse Ehrenfeld. The event will also be videocast live at https:// the Grand Hyatt Washington hotel, was videocast.nih.gov/. attended by more than 500 health sector For more information, contact Cindy Clark at cindy. representatives, including members of Congress and administration officials. [email protected] or call (301) 496-1080. Check for program details and updates at https://www. NCCIH’s Integrative Medicine Research Lecture for NIH adult employees, contractors, fellows and nihlibrary.nih.gov/scholarly-publishing-symposium. Series (see https://nccih.nih.gov/news/events/ patients and NOAA employees. The spring course IMlectures). Two other lectures in the series are will be offered from Mar. 31 to May 12. For details, New Approaches to Pain and Mental scheduled for May 11 and June 30. visit http://www.nihsail.org/training/. Health Featured in NCCIH Talks The in-class sessions are held on the NIH campus This spring, the National Center for Complementary Women’s History Month Workshop Set, and the onboard (on the water) sessions are held and Integrative Health offers several lectures on the Mar. 10 in Wilson Hall at Selby Bay on the South River near Edgewater, theme of “Novel Approaches at the Intersection of The Office of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion will Md. Participants must be able to provide or arrange Mental Health and Pain.” celebrate Women’s History Month with “The Whole for their own transportation to both the in-class At the first talk, on Woman 2020 Vision Workshop” featuring keynote and onboard sessions. If you are interested in the Tuesday, Mar. 24, speaker Dr. Janine Clayton, director of the Office course and would like more information, contact at 11 a.m. in Lipsett of Research on Women’s Health. The workshop will NIHSA at [email protected]. Amphitheater, Bldg. be held on Tuesday, Mar. 10 from 1 to 3:30 p.m. in If you are an experienced sailor and would like to 10, Dr. Eric Garland will Wilson Hall, Bldg. 1. charter NIHSA boats, contact the group at www. speak on “Mindfulness- Clayton will present nihsail.org/rating about joining the club and doing Oriented Recovery “30 Years of a check-out sail. NIHSA is always looking for experi- Enhancement: Women’s Health enced volunteers to help with both in-class and Restructuring Reward Breakthroughs.” onboard instruction. Processing in Addiction, Other topics and pre- Stress and Pain.” senters include views NIH Publishes New ‘NOSIs’ on wellness with the In some of our most NIH recently published two Notices of Special Dr. Eric Garland pressing “diseases Employee Assistance Program, mentoring Interest (NOSIs) announcing administrative of despair,” such as supplements to expand the scope of funded addiction and chronic pain, the brain’s capacity with the NIH Training Center, FEVS data and investigations on U3 populations and sex/gender to experience pleasure and extract meaning from influences. natural sources becomes disrupted. Opioid misuse women at NIH with can become a way to try to hold onto a shrinking EDI/Data Analytics. The first NOSI, Administrative Supplements for Dr. Janine Clayton sense of well-being. There will also be a Research on the Health of Women of Understudied, panel discussion on Underrepresented and Underreported (U3) Garland has developed a nondrug intervention Populations, announces support of biomedical for opioid misuse that unites mindfulness medi- work and life balance led by the Office of Intramural Training and Education. research highlighting health disparities among tation, cognitive behavioral therapy and positive women of U3 populations. psychology. A member of the NIH HEAL Initiative Sign language interpreters will be provided. multidisciplinary working group, Garland is Individuals with disabilities who need reasonable The second NOSI, Administrative Supplements for professor and associate dean for research at the accommodation to participate should contact Joy Research on Sex/Gender Influences, announces University of Utah College of Social Work, director Gaines at [email protected] or the Federal Relay, support of research highlighting the impact of sex/ of the Center on Mindfulness and Integrative (800) 877-8339. gender influences in human health and illness. Health Intervention Development and a licensed psychotherapist. His Ph.D. in social work is from the The due date for both applications is Jan. 26, 2021. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Interested in Learning How to Sail? More information is available from the Office of The lecture, which will be videocast, is part of The NIH Sailing Association (NIHSA), an R&W sup- Research on Women’s Health. ported club, offers an Introduction to Sailing course 2 • NIH RECORD • MARCH 6, 2020 Cooper’s research program examines the effec- WALS Talks Feature Nobel tiveness of multilevel strategies for advancing health equity in the United States and sub-Saharan Laureate Allison, Dyer Africa. She has conducted observational studies to describe attitudinal barriers to equitable health Lecturer Cooper status and health care among patients from diverse racial and ethnic groups, and to elucidate mech- The NIH Director’s Wednesday Afternoon Lecture anisms, such as the quality of social relationships, Series (WALS) will host the second of three NIH for racial and socioeconomic disparities in health Director’s Lectures on Mar.