Nov. 24, 2015 | The UAMS Translational Research Institute announced recipients of two pilot grants aimed at stimulating collaborative research with institutions in other states.

UAMS’ Joshua Kennedy, M.D., is the co-leader of a one-year project with the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center (UNM HSC).  Another project is co-led by UAMS’ Sean Adams, Ph.D., with John Thyfault, Ph.D., at the University of Kansas Medical Center (KUMC).

The competitive awards were made available through the Western States Consortium Pilot Awards program. The consortium includes the University of Utah in addition to UAMS, KUMC and UNM HSC. Of the eight applications submitted, three one-year pilots of up to $50,000 were awarded, with costs shared by the institutions.

“Collaboration is essential in successful translational research, and I am proud that UAMS researchers represent two of the three projects selected for the 2015 program,” said TRI Director Laura James, M.D.

The UAMS – UNM HSC project, “Host-Pathogen Genomic Determinants of Pediatric Respiratory Infection Severity,” will study the role of genetics in children with acute respiratory infections.

Kennedy is 2013 recipient of the Translational Research Institute’s KL2 Mentored Research Career Development Award. His primary collaborator at UNM, Darrell Dinwiddie, Ph.D., is also a KL2 recipient.

The pilot award is expected to strengthen their ongoing KL2 research programs by uniquely blending their expertise in genetics, next-generation sequencing, virology, clinical infectious disease, and allergy and immunology.  The project, which will enroll 100 pediatric patients, involves two distinct populations with differing respiratory infection patterns.

The UAMS – KUMC project is titled “Metabolomics Signatures That Occur in Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) Patients With and Without Type 2 Diabetes in Comparison to Controls (non-AD) With or Without Type 2 Diabetes.”  The two institutions are combining their expertise in Alzheimer’s disease and type 2 diabetes (KUMC), and metabolomics and bioinformatics in metabolic disease states including type 2 diabetes (UAMS). They anticipate their work will provide key information on the links between type 2 diabetes and Alzheimer’s. It will also provide metabolic-based information on the cause and development of Alzheimer’s and possibly highlight therapeutic targets.

Other researchers on the project are UAMS’ Kartik Shankar, Ph.D., and KUMC’s Jill Morris, Ph.D., and Brian Piccolo, Ph.D.

Nov. 20, 2015 | Twenty-five community groups were honored Nov. 13 for their contributions to research at the 3^rd annual Community Partner Celebration sponsored by the UAMS Translational Research Institute (TRI).

The celebration, at the Center at University Park in Little Rock, included welcome remarks from TRI Director Laura James, M.D., and UAMS Chancellor Dan Rahn, M.D. The keynote speaker was Kathryn Hall-Trujillo, M.P.H., founder of the Birthing Project USA, which began as a community project to assist pregnant women and has been replicated in other countries.

The key message to the 88 attendees representing 21 grassroots community organizations and four advisory boards, was how important their work is to finding solutions to society’s most challenging health problems.

Rahn noted that Arkansas ranks at or near the bottom on virtually every key measure of health. No matter how much knowledge there is about obesity, diabetes or cancer deaths, he said, it is of no value without new, innovative approaches to improving health.

“If we keep doing what we’ve been doing we’ll get what we already got,” Rahn said. “We don’t know what to do about the different health outcomes, the health disparities that disproportionately impact on people of color, people in rural areas, people in poverty, and people with low educational attainment.

“The future hinges on some new ways of thinking and developing new knowledge and new methodologies to actually change the future,” he added. “That’s what you can help us with. We thank you for doing this, we thank you for partnering with us. We truly need our partners to help us chart a course for a healthier tomorrow.”

James said the perspective of UAMS’ grassroots partners is key.

“We need to interact with our community partners, and we need to partner with you to do research that is the most meaningful to Arkansans,” James said. “What’s important about tonight is we are celebrating and thinking about how we can in partnership take scientific discoveries or new findings and push them into the homes and families and communities and churches out in the state to improve the health of our state.”

Featured speaker Hall-Trujillo, an Arkansas native whose Birthing Project has become an international model for helping pregnant women, praised the work of the attendees.  A key to the success of her project was realizing the need for communities to understand how important systems and resources work, such as university, medical, education, housing and legal systems.

“The resources we brought to the table were partnered with people who had resources,” Hall-Trujillo said. “What we need to do is be the best relationship builders, the best ambassadors and best liaisons for the families we support.  I can see by looking at this room, that that is exactly what you’re doing, and I applaud you for doing it, and I can see a better place.”

The community organizations honored this year are:

Arkansas Community Health Worker Association (ARCHWA)

Arkansas Voices for the Children Left Behind

Cisneros Center for New Americans

Divine Deliverance

East Arkansas Family Health Center

El Zócalo Immigrant Resource Center

First Baptist Dew Drop Church

Hispanic Women’s Organization of Arkansas

House of Benjamin

Human Rights Campaign

King’s Chapel

Lee County Cooperative Clinic

New Light MBC

Oak Forest United Methodist Church

Planting A Seed Foundation

Pleasant View Ministries Church

Regenerated Missionary Baptist Church

Rural Community Alliance

Seeds of Liberation

Washington Regional Medical Center Employee Education Department

Young Adult Opportunity Center

The community advisory boards honored this year are:

Arkansas Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders Task Force

Thomas & Lyon Longevity Clinic Patient

and Family Advisory Council

TransForm Health Arkansas Research Working Group

UAMS Hospital Patient and Family Advisory Council

VIEW THE EVENT PHOTO ALBUM

The November issue of TRI’s newsletter, The TRIbune, is now available. This issue features our clinical trials services, our promotion of health sciences innovation and entrepreneurship, KL2 Awardee Ling Gao, M.D., Ph.D., published in the NEJM, and TRI-cited publications.  

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TRI is pleased to be able to offer Mock Study Sections for any researcher seeking review of an external grant application. Reviews are available for laboratory, animal and human

participant study proposals. New submissions and resubmissions will be considered. Interested researchers can request a Mock Study Section through the TRI Portal (TRIServices@uams.edu) and should submit draft copies of their proposal, budget, and biosketch, as well as comments from a previous submission (if applicable).  The request deadline for review of February proposals is Dec. 4, 2015.

Mock Study Sections are intended to be learning experiences and investigators should plan to be present. Collaborators are also encouraged to attend. Participating investigators will be expected to provide TRI with follow-up information on grant submission outcomes, scores and funding awards.

Oct. 22, 2015 | Behind the headlines of his breast cancer vaccine, now in a phase II clinical trial, UAMS’ Thomas Kieber-Emmons, Ph.D., tells a back story that inspires him and even draws applause from colleagues.

Kieber-Emmons peppers the story with some significant numbers: 1, 6, 28, 1,500, 4,000. The story begins in 2005 with 1, meaning  Kieber-Emmons’ first-in-man, computer-designed vaccine. No researcher at UAMS had developed such a vaccine or attempted the mammoth effort to deliver a synthesized product that could be safely tested in humans.

“This is not for the faint of heart,” he said.

In addition to required preclinical safety/toxicity studies mandated by the FDA, which were firsts in their own right at UAMS, requiring a rethinking of how the institution viewed such studies, Kieber-Emmons sought assistance within UAMS to prepare his investigational new drug (IND) application for the FDA.  A meeting was arranged with the then-Research Support Center, now the Office of Research Regulatory Affairs.

“There were 28 people there,” he recalled, shaking his head in amazement. “My first thought was, ‘why 28?’ So many people were part of this story, and it turns out they all had a meaningful role to play. It really did take a village.”

Having joined UAMS from the University of Pennsylvania, which has a much larger biomedical research enterprise, Kieber-Emmons was astonished that UAMS had such expertise. His previous employer would have had to hire a contract firm to handle what UAMS did by itself, he said. “It’s just phenomenal. The resources that UAMS brought to this is big-time.”

Still, getting his vaccine discovery into a form that could be tested in humans tested the limits of UAMS’ research resources, said Larry Parker, a mainstay on the project as Quality Assurance Unit manager for the Office of Research Regulatory Affairs.

“We were stretched to pull it off,” he said. “There are a lot of wheels and gears that have to be moving in the right direction to do this kind of stuff.”

Other key staff included Carole Hamon, Regulatory Affairs Unit Manager (retired, 2014), and Raymond Anderson, Quality Assurance Unit manager (retired, 2009).

In addition to numerous meetings with FDA staff, there were weekly meetings involving Kieber-Emmons and UAMS staff as they worked to meet the agency’s extensive safety requirements. Their work included writing 97 standard operating procedures (SOPs) that required the agency’s approval.

The IND application, submitted in 2011, was more than 1,500 pages, the largest IND application ever submitted by UAMS. Of all the numbers in Kieber-Emmons’ story, six may be his most prized; that’s how many questions the FDA posed after its review of the application.

“I’m almost more proud of that than the results of the vaccine, which is doing very well,” Kieber-Emmons said. “Other investigators are just amazed when I tell them there were only six questions; people clap.”

The FDA’s questions were received by Kieber-Emmons late on a Friday, and he and staff went to work that weekend drafting their responses, which went in the mail on Monday.

The experience speaks to the quality of people at the Office of Research Regulatory Affairs, he said.

“Our research support people know what they’re doing and they are very careful, so I love them, and I think they’re just the best,” he said.

The vaccine proved to be safe in a phase I trial. The phase II trial is examining if the vaccine improves the efficacy of preoperative chemotherapy. The trial includes women who are newly diagnosed with breast cancer to determine if the combination of vaccine and standard chemotherapy improves the benefit from preoperative therapy.

The heavy workload on Kieber-Emmons’ project continues for the UAMS Office of Research Regulatory Affairs. Annual reports, adverse event reporting and annual product stability testing are all part of the project’s management. Parker’s work, Kieber-Emmons said, includes working closely with the company that manufactures the vaccine, another company that tests the manufacturing process and a third company that is putting the vaccine into vials.

In his quality assurance/project management role, Parker has been the UAMS contact with these three companies. His job has included planning of testing protocols, manufacturing/testing timelines, review and approval of batch records, product labels, and testing reports. He organizes all the product information from the companies into a format required by FDA for submission.

Parker notes that he has more than 4,000 emails specific to the project dating to March 2006, and several people in his office have in excess of 1,000 emails for the project.

“We’re in the process of filing the fifth complete version of the Chemistry Manufacturing and Control (CMC) section of the IND,” Parker said. “Each of these versions has been in excess of 450 pages, and the current revision is in excess of 600 pages. This doesn’t include the filing of all protocol amendments and annual progress reports to the IND.  Needless to say, we’ve killed a few trees to keep this IND up to date with FDA.”

The Office of Research Regulatory Affairs currently manages 15 active INDs that include 20 current clinical trials and 15 investigational device exemptions (IDEs). Parker urges researchers to call his office if they are planning regulated research such as for new drugs or devices.

“Call us sooner rather than later,” he said. “The later we’re involved, the more work the researcher has to redo.”

The Office of Research Regulatory Affairs can be reached at 501-526-6876.

Oct. 15, 2015 | Identifying a patient’s genetic mutation led University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) physician-researcher Ling Gao, M.D., Ph.D., to an existing drug that eliminated the patient’s stage IV Merkel-cell carcinoma. Gao’s findings, made in collaboration with two other UAMS researchers, were published today in The New England Journal of Medicine.

Gao is a recipient of the UAMS Translational Research Institute’s (TRI) KL2 Mentored Research Career Development Scholar Award, which provided two years of research funding and translational research training.

Metastatic Merkel-cell carcinoma is often fatal and there is no effective treatment. Gao’s 86-year-old female patient was diagnosed in 2013 with stage IIIB Merkel-cell carcinoma of the right temple. She had surgery and received radiation therapy in May 2013 and additional surgery in July 2014. In November 2014, doctors confirmed that the cancer had metastasized.

Gao, a dermatologist who treats Merkel-cell carcinoma patients from Arkansas and surrounding states, performed genetics tests on the tumor that revealed multiple mutations, including PI3Kδ.

Gao was aware that the drug idelalisib is a novel PI3K pathway inhibitor approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for treatment of B-cell lymphoma, a cancer of the blood. She was also aware of recent studies showing that disruption of the PI3Kδ mutation allows the body to mount an effective antitumor immune response.

On the basis of her laboratory work and knowledge of idelalisb, Gao began treatment of the patient with the drug on Feb. 6, 2015.

Three months after administering the idelalisib, there was no sign of the tumor in the patient’s liver, Gao said. Her findings were published in the Journal in a letter to the editor.

Based on what she’s learned, Gao said the case can be made for further study of PI3Kδ inhibitors like idelalisib in solid tumors, not just blood cancers.

“The efficacy of idelalisib in our patient provides initial clinical evidence that the targeting of PI3Kδ in Merkel-cell carcinoma is warranted,” Gao said in the letter, which  was also signed by UAMS’ Fade Mahmoud, M.D., and Mallory B. Shiver, M.D.

Gao also credits support she received from Peter Emanuel, M.D., director of the UAMS Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, and James Suen, M.D., chair of the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery in the UAMS College of Medicine.

View the article and accompanying PET-CT findings here.

Gao’s research has been supported by the UAMS Translational Research Institute through the National Institutes of Health National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, the Department of Dermatology in the UAMS College of Medicine, UAMS Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, and the Arkansas Biosciences Institute.

UAMS’ Aliza Brown, Ph.D., recently received a nearly $200,000 Genentech stroke research award after she incorporated ideas in her application from the first TRI Research Forum in June 2014.

The grant was one of only three community stroke pilots funded by Genentech in the United States. The study will enable Brown to determine paramedics’ recognition of stroke and whether stroke patients are being taken to stroke-ready hospitals.  In addition, she is developing an educational video for paramedics in partnership with the UAMS-led Arkansas SAVES (Stroke Assistance through Virtual Emergency Support) telestroke program and the Arkansas Department of Health’s Arkansas Stroke Registry.

Her hope is that the study will provide data to support state sanctioned stroke guidelines and practices for emergency medical services.

“The Department of Health is very interested in this project because this will help promote legislation for the stroke guidelines and to create a stroke dashboard to guide EMS agencies to the appropriate hospitals,” Brown said.

Brown, an assistant professor of radiology, joked that she was TRI’s first Research Forum “guinea pig.” The forums include established researchers and biostatisticians who provide feedback on investigators’ grant applications.

“The forum panel was excited about the application and said it was very translational,” Brown said. “They gave me some great advice. I learned a lot and I got a pretty good grant out of it.”

A key recommendation came from Jean McSweeney, Ph.D., R.N., professor and interim dean of the College of Nursing. “Dr. McSweeney suggested that the study include utilization of the Simulation Center and an educational intervention, so I did that,” Brown said.

Her study will validate the educational intervention – a training video – by measuring Pulaski County paramedics’ stroke recognition rates following training. Garland County EMS will serve as the control, where EMS workers will not receive the training video and whose stroke recognition rates will be followed concurrently.

“I hope that this study can provide data the state needs to make these stroke guidelines a reality,” Brown said.

To date, TRI has hosted nine Research Forums. To request a forum, email TRIservices@uams.edu.