Date: October 17, 2023 @ 4:00 PM Eastern Time
Venue: Zoom
Speaker: Bryana N. Harris, Ph.D. Candidate
Affiliation: Biomedical Engineering at University of Virginia
Title: Systems approach to identify novel mechanisms driving cardiomyocyte proliferation
Abstract: The decisions of the heart to contract, grow, proliferate, or die are mediated by molecular networks that are evolved to adapt to physiologic stresses but counter-intuitively exacerbate cardiac disease. After an injury, our hearts struggle to overcome the loss of cardiomyocytes leading to heart failure. Current therapies can temporarily improve the heart’s function but do not promote cardiac regeneration. Specifically, the current drugs primarily target cell surface receptors because we lack the knowledge of how to control complex signaling networks. In this talk, I will discuss our efforts to bioengineer cardiomyocyte signaling networks by designing the first computational model of cardiac proliferation signaling to provide a systems-level understanding of cardiomyocyte proliferation. I will show applications of this model for understanding how cardiomyocytes will respond to stimuli in the proliferation regulatory network and how we can identify potential therapeutic regulators that induce cardiomyocyte proliferation.