Jean Hardwick Receives NIH Grant to Support Heart Function Research

Assistant professor of biology Jean Hardwick has received an Academic Research Enhancement Award from the National Institutes of Health to complete her research into the roles played by the immune and nervous systems in regulating heart function. The grant will provide $120,241 over three years to cover the cost of purchasing equipment, as well as stipends for participating undergraduates.

"The purpose of the research is to gain a better understanding of how the body maintains a constant internal environment," Hardwick says. "We’re particularly interested in how the nervous system regulates the function of the heart to help maintain this healthy condition. The studies we’re doing now focus on how our immune system may work together with the nervous system to help maintain the heart."

For example, if a blood vessel supplying the heart with oxygen and other nutrients were to become blocked, the immune system would detect this and release chemicals to help correct the problem --- a process called an inflammatory response. One possible action of these inflammatory chemicals might be to alter the activity of the local nervous system to slow down the heart and conserve resources until the blood flow problem is corrected. "We hope to test this hypothesis by studying how inflammatory chemicals can alter the activity of individual neurons located in the heart," Hardwick says.

The current AREA grant is her second at Ithaca College. In 1998 Hardwick was awarded a three-year, $88,650 AREA grant for the same project.

"The AREA program was designed to provide funds to stimulate research in educational institutions that seriously involve undergraduates in health-related research," Hardwick says. "Since undergraduates, under my direction, perform 99 percent of the research studies related to this project, our research was particularly attractive to the National Institutes of Health."

On average, five to six undergraduates perform laboratory work on various aspects of the project during the academic year, with two students working in the lab during summers. They have presented the results of their research at various national and international scholarly meetings. Last year, for example, Melanie Powers ’01 made a presentation at the International Society for Neuroscience meeting in New Orleans. Powers also coauthored a paper, along with Hardwick and Beth Peterson ’01, that described earlier research on the project.

"Ithaca College trains a significant number of future scientists, with more than half of our biology and biochemistry majors going on to various postgraduate programs across the country," Hardwick says. "The College is becoming known for producing outstanding graduate students, and this can only continue if faculty members are maintaining vital and exciting projects. I’m proud of the success my students have achieved as a result of their research activities."

Jean Hardwick (left) and Kristen Sager ’02 record the electrical activity inside the neurons of a guinea pig cell, using equipment purchased with funding by a 1998 Academic Research Enhancement Award from the National Institutes of Health. A second AREA grant awarded this year will allow Hardwick and her students to continue their study of the ways the nervous and immune systems regulate heart function. Sager, a senior biology major in the School of Humanities and Sciences Honors Program, has presented her research in poster sessions at the Eastern Colleges Science Conference in New York City and the National Collegiate Honors Council conference in Washington, D.C.

Photo by Keith Davis