Congratulations to Gator Nursing faculty member Dr. Keesha Roach! She received award notification for a research project she applied for as part of her participation in the Programs to Increase Diversity Among Individuals Engaged in Health-Related Research-Functional and Translational Genomics program through the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI). This research project award extends her K01 Award, titled “Contributions of biopsychosocial factors in sickle cell disease pain.” It extends her K01 by allowing her to Develop a Network associated with AVPR1A by proteomic and interatomic analyses. Her grant aims to understand the biological and psychological mechanisms that contribute to the significant pain and stress experienced by individuals with Sickle Cell Disease (SCD). This grant will investigate the role of vasopressin (i.e., hormone that plays a buffering role in the response to stress) in patients with SCD. In addition, multiple modalities of clinical and experimental pain will be assessed in both an existing dataset and a prospective set of adult patients with SCD, as well as performing an unbiased search for genetic variation related to SCD pain phenotypes (e.g., AVPR1A genotype).
Read about her diversity research efforts here: The Gator Nurse