Research Programs
Overview
Research defining the mechanisms, diagnosis, and treatment of lung disease and critical illness is our central mission. Our research is collaborative and cross-disciplinary with a diverse group of PhD, MD, and MD-PhD investigators across the basic and clinical science continuum. We welcome learners at all levels – enthusiasm is the key, not pedigree. Contact us here!
Fellowship involvement in clinical investigation is supported by a National Institute of Health NHLBI funded Research Training in Respiratory Biology training grant.
A link to a more detailed description of research in the Section of Pulmonary and Critical Care medicine and selected recent publications.
Our research spans the pulmonary/critical care clinical spectrum:
- Acute lung injury
- Asthma
- Critical illness
- Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
- Cystic fibrosis
- Environmental / smoking related lung disease
- Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis
- Health systems / data science
- Lung cancer
- Mechanical ventilation
- Obesity
- Sarcoidosis
- Sleep
Basic Research
We have made recent critical discoveries, such as defining how environmental exposure affects childhood asthma, novel signaling pathways in lung injury, cell metabolic pathways necessary for pulmonary fibrosis, and how cell migration is intimately linked with energy generation. A description of faculty research interests may be found here and here.
Clinical Research
Clinical investigation takes place in the outpatient clinics, intensive care units, and increasingly in the cloud. The outpatient clinical investigation team has a history of groundbreaking innovation leading to new pharmaceuticals for the general public. We also conduct inpatient trials on a constant basis including discovering novel medications and treatment algorithms for critical illness. In the past 15 years, more than 3800 patients have been enrolled in more than 80 individual protocols. These studies have yielded more than 60 publications. Clinical research faculty and a description of their research interests, discoveries, and publications may be found here and here.
With multiple studies operating at all times, any patient with an interest in participating will find a trial appropriate to their lung condition actively recruiting or being implemented in the near future. Patients with interests in such state-of-the-art medicine are encouraged to contact our study programs.