Category: Centers
UNC Team Receives NIH Grant for Tuberculosis Research
February 27, 2014Researchers at the UNC School of Medicine and the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy have received a grant from the National Institutes of Health for research aimed at developing novel tuberculosis drugs. The grant will provide more than $417,000 over two years to support a collaboration between principal investigators Miriam Braunstein, PhD, and William Janzen. Braunstein is a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the UNC School of Medicine. Janzen is the director of assay development and compound profiling at the Center for Integrative Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. Tuberculosis … Read more
Mumper Receives Alumni Award from University of Kentucky
January 27, 2014Russell Mumper, PhD, vice dean of the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, has been named as the 2013 recipient of the 2013 University of Kentucky Outstanding Graduate Program Alumnus for the Pharmaceutical Sciences award. The award recognizes graduates of the UK graduate program for their accomplishments and contributions to scholarship, education, and research in the pharmaceutical sciences. Mumper will receive the award at the University of Kentucky on January 31, 2014. This marks the second time a School faculty member has received the honor. Kim Brouwer, PharmD, PhD, the William R. Kenan Jr. Distinguished Professor and chair of the Division of … Read more
UNC Researchers Receive NIH Grant to Improve Efficacy of Chemotherapy Drugs
January 21, 2014A team led by Cyrus Vaziri, PhD, and William Janzen at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has received a grant from the National Institutes of Health for research that could help make chemotherapy drugs more effective. Vaziri, the lead principal investigator on the grant, is an associate professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the UNC School of Medicine. Janzen is the director of assay development and compound profiling at the Center for Integrative Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. The R01 grant will provide up to $860,000 … Read more
Kabanov Named a Member of Elite European Academy
November 25, 2013Alexander “Sasha” Kabanov, PhD, has been named a member of the Academia Europaea, joining a distinguished group whose members include fifty-two Nobel Laureates. Kabanov is the Mescal S. Ferguson Distinguished Professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. He also oversees the School’s Center for Nanotechnology in Drug Delivery and codirects the Carolina Institute for Nanomedicine. Academia Europaea has about 3,000 members, which include leading experts from the physical sciences and technology, biological sciences and medicine, mathematics, the letters and humanities, social and cognitive sciences, economics, and law. New members are nominated by their peers and are evaluated based on … Read more
AAPS Honors Huang with Distinguished Pharmaceutical Scientist Award
November 18, 2013Leaf Huang, PhD, is the 2013 recipient of the Distinguished Pharmaceutical Scientist Award given by the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists. Huang is a Fred Eshelman Distinguished Professor in the School’s Division of Molecular Pharmaceutics and is a member of the Center for Nanotechnology in Drug Delivery and the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center. He received the award from AAPS President Anthony J. DeStefano, PhD, during the opening session of the 2013 AAPS Annual Meeting and Exposition. “This award is the highest distinction awarded by the most prominent organization of pharmaceutical scientists in the world,” says Bob Blouin, PharmD, dean … Read more
New Leadership, Emphasis, and Name for UNC Pharmacogenomics Center
November 12, 2013IPIT drops “institute” in favor of “center” to become CPIT Tim Wiltshire is the new director. Federico Innocenti is the associate director. CPIT pursues genetic research aimed at getting patients the best results from medicines. Tim Wiltshire, PhD, has been named director of the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy’s Center for Pharmacogenomics and Individualized Therapy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Federico Innocenti, MD, PhD, will serve as associate director. Wiltshire succeeds Howard McLeod, PharmD, who is now medical director at the DeBartolo Family Personalized Medicine Institute at the University of South Florida Moffitt Cancer Center. Wiltshire … Read more
Sam Lai Receives Packard Fellowship in Science and Engineering
October 31, 2013Assistant Professor Sam Lai, PhD, is a recipient of a 2013 Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering, a five-year, $875,000 award that recognizes the nation’s most innovative young scientists. Lai is one of only sixteen recipients nationwide selected from a pool of 100 scientists who are nominated by fifty major research universities. His work combines biophysics and immunology to investigate how antibodies secreted into mucus may interact with mucus constituents to reinforce the body’s first line of defense against pathogens. Lai’s goal is to harness these insights to engineer next-generation antibodies and vaccines for improved protection and therapy at mucosal surfaces. … Read more
Jin Receives NIH Grant to Develop Chemical Probes
July 10, 2013Two years ago, Jian Jin, PhD, and a team of researchers created chemical probes that specifically hone in on the enzymes G9a and GLP, two relatively new potential drug targets. Now, Jin has an R01 grant from the National Institutes of Health to take that research to the next level. Jin, an associate professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, has received a three-year, $950,000 grant to develop in vivo chemical probes for targeting the two proteins, which affect a wide range of biological functions in humans. The research will build on Jin’s work in 2011, when he led … Read more
Impact Award: Dan Hertz Predicts Paclitaxel-Induced Neuropathy
May 9, 2013Paclitaxel is a drug commonly used to treat breast, ovarian and lung cancer that can cause a progressive loss of dexterity and balance, known as peripheral neuropathy, in some patients. Currently there are no proven methods for predicting, preventing, or treating this common side effect. Discovery of a predictive biomarker could enable clinicians to identify patients at high risk of neuropathy prior to initiation of treatment. Working with a cohort of patients derived from the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center’s Carolina Breast Cancer Study database, graduate student Dan Hertz, PharmD, PhD, analyzed genetic and demographic data to establish that paclitaxel-treated … Read more
School Researchers Discover First-in-Class Chemical Probe
March 7, 2013A team of scientists led by researchers at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy have discovered a first-in-class chemical probe that will give researchers a powerful tool to investigate the function of malignant brain tumor domains in biology and disease. The discovery is discussed in the cover story of the March 2013 issue of Nature Chemical Biology. Lindsey James, PhD, a research assistant professor at the School, is the first author for the article. Stephen Frye, a Fred Eshelman Distinguished Professor at the School and director of the School’s Center for Integrative Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery, is one of … Read more