Research

The Mission of Research in the Charles E. Schmidt College of Biomedical Science at Florida Atlantic University (FAU) is to provide outstanding teaching, research and service to FAU, State of Florida and beyond. The faculty at the College is engaged in cutting edge research in all fronts of modern biomedical sciences. Some of the focused areas are summarized below:

• RNA metabolism in bacterial pathogens and its functions promoting oxidative stress survival and governing virulence gene expression (Z. Li and C. Burns).
• Novel treatment approaches for treatment of arthritis and other inflammatory diseases by engineering enzymes and inhibitors (K. Brew)
• Neurotransmitter systems and neurodegenerative diseases with concentration on GABA and glutamate neurotransmitter systems as well as brain diseases, e.g., Parkinson's Disease, Alzeheimer's Disease, Huntington's Disease and stroke (J.-Y. Wu, J. Wei, Z. Li and D. Maharaj).
• Developmental neurobiology and responses to brain injury with a concentration on adult neurogenesis and neuronal survival, and their underlying mechanisms, particularly the roles of synaptic connections, trophic factors and sensory activity. (K. Guthrie).
• Behavioral neurobiology with concentration on drug abuse and addiction (R.Tao and C. Isgor).
• Physiology and pathophysiology of cardio vascular system with focus on heart development, heart vascular biology and heart physiology (L. Lemanski, X. Huang and H. Prentice).
• Molecular genetics and biochemistry of mitochondrial and oxidative stress diseases of aging including age-related cataract, age-related macular degeneration and glaucoma. (M. Kantorow).
• Visual system with concentration on macular degeneration, diabetes retinopathy, retina electrophysiology, dry eyes and gene therapy for retinal diseases (W. Shen, K. Dorey, C. Dougherty and A. Azzarolo).
• Immunology and allergy research with concentration on immune response and asthma (Y. Shibata).
• Immunobiology of dendritic cells with focus on designing therapeutic strategies for the treatment of cancer, autoimmune diseases and transplant rejection (M. Nouri-Shirazi).
• Cancer research with concentration on prostate cancer, HIV and other forms of cancer (M. Lu, M. Caputi, V. Iragavarapu, K. Brew and D. Maharaj).
• Other areas of research interest include stem cell technology, biomarkers identification and validation, epidemiology and medical education. (M. Friedland, W. Paull, R. Blanks, D. Maharaj, D. Lichtstein, and S. Wragg).