Translational Cardiovascular Studies Section

Edward G. Lakatta, MD, Chief

This section was initiated in 1994 as a Gene Therapy Unit. Its initial focus was to use therapeutic nonreplicative adenoviral cassettes to promote angiogenesis in the context of an ischemic hind limb model in rats and rabbits. The unit has amassed the expertise in modern technologies (such as doppler-echocardiography and pressure volume loop analysis) to measure cardiovascular performance in rodents in vivo and has gained experience in assessment of cardiac remodeling. Eventually the unit successfully demonstrated its utility to conduct a wide range of translational cardiovascular research to bridge the gap between molecular and cell studies and whole animal physiology.

The unit became a magnet for the LCS researchers and other laboratories of the NIA seeking to verify their bench-born ideas in preclinical animal trials.

List of Portfolio/Research Areas

Therapeutic Angiogenesis
Translational Studies, Targeting Early and Late Left Ventricular Remodeling
To investigate pathophysiological processes associated with chronic heart failure (CHF) and to test novel preventive strategies and treatment possibilities to reduce the devastation impact of CHF on the aging society.

The four major directions of the TCSS research are:

Dietary, behavioral, or food supplemental strategies to increase myocardial tolerance to ischemic damage
Novel therapeutic interventions to reduce the extent of myocardial damage during the developing MI
Novel therapeutic and dietary interventions attenuating the progression of existing CHF; and
4. Assessment of heart rate variability in animal models in vivo.

Findings and Publications

Ahmet I, Tae HJ, Lakatta EG, Talan M. Long-term low dose dietary resveratrol supplement reduces cardiovascular structural and functional deterioration in chronic heart failure in rats. Can J Physiol Pharmacol. 2017 Mar;95(3):268-274. doi: 10.1139/cjpp-2016-0512. Epub 2016 Dec 17. PMID: 28134561

Petrasheskaya N, Tae HJ, Ahmet I, Talan MI, Lakatta EG, Lin L. A rat carotid balloon injury model to test anti-vascular remodeling therapeutics. J Vis Exp. 2016 Sep 19;(115). doi: 10.3791/53777. PMID: 27684727

Tae HJ, Petrashevskaya N, Marshall S, Krawczyk M, Talan M. Cardiac remodeling in the mouse model of Marfan syndrome develops into two distinctive phenotypes. Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol. 2016 Jan 15;310(2):H290-9. doi: 10.1152/ajpheart.00354.2015. PMID: 26566724