Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center (OAIC) 1999 - 2004
Collaborative Efforts with other Pepper Centers
We have established collaborations between UTMB, Wake Forest and University of Maryland to determine by genomics and proteomics analyses the biochemical phenotype of the skeletal muscles of elderly (sarcopenia) and the effects of cardiovascular failure and stroke on muscle atrophy. We have developed genomics and proteomics capabilities for the analysis of mitochondrial function and biogenesis; these are available to the Pepper OAIC investigators, we propose to extend these capabilities for the further development of custom genomics and proteomics microarrays that would address biological processes of importance to aging.
Wake Forrest Pepper Supplement
John Papaconstantinou, Ph.D., Project title, "In Vitro Mechanistic Studies of Skeletal Muscle Function: Analysis of Mitochondrial Gene Expression"
Overview: The goal of this project is to analyze the oxidative activities and gene and protein expression in older human skeletal muscle. More specifically this development project will use a microarray of known human mitochondrial genes to determine the levels of corresponding mRNAs in skeletal muscle from heart failure patients and in healthy, but functionally limited, elderly adults who are enrolled in three OAIC-supported clinical studies designed to improve physical performance. The microarray was constructed in my laboratory at UTMB. Construction of a human mitochondrial gene library of 350 known mitochondrial genes is in progress. These gene sequences will be used to prepare microarrays for this project. Completion of the human mitochondrial gene library of 350 known mitochondrial genes is in progress.
University of Maryland Claude D. Pepper Center Supplement Award
UTMB Co-Investigator: John Papaconstantinou, Ph.D. Project title: "Inflammatory-Oxidative Injury in Hemiparetic Muscle after Stroke"
Overview: This NIH supplement utilizes a cross-sectional design with bilateral vastus lateralis (VL) muscle biopsies from untrained chronic hemiparetic stroke patients for University of Maryland (UM) to evaluate side-to-side differences in (a) TNF and iNOS expression, (b) total muscle protein oxidative stress by proteomics, and (c) markers of p38 MAPK pathway activation to identify the mechanisms and magnitude of inflammatory-oxidative injury in NIA-R29 study at UM of treadmill exercise in stroke patients, and an additional N=20 bilateral biopsies anticipated to accrue during the 2nd year of the UM Pepper Intervention Development Study-1 (IDS-1).