Department of Medical Engineering Professor Chris Passaglia was recently sub-awarded a $282,335 R01 grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences within the National Institutes of Health to examine the effectiveness of different drug cocktails at promoting axon regeneration in the crushed rat optic nerve. The project 鈥� Systems Pharmacology for Overcoming Cell Variability 鈥� has the goal of restoring functional connectivity between the eye and brain after optic nerve injury.
Passaglia, who is a project co-principal investigator, is collaborating with New York-based Mount Sinai Institute for Systems Biomedicine Director Ravi Iyengar, who was also awarded an NIH NIGMS grant for the project. An R01 grant is the oldest historical grant mechanism used by the NIH, which provides up to five years of support for health-related research and development based on the mission of the NIH.