The Animal Models R24 Research Network Announces Inaugural Cohort of 2020-2021 Pilot Projects
The NIA supported Research Network on Animal Models to Understand Social Dimensions of Aging , under the leadership of Jenny Tung, Duke University, Alessandro Bartolomucci, University of Minnesota, and Kathleen Mullan Harris, UNC, recently awarded its inaugural round of 2020-2021 pilot projects. The goal of the Pilot Program is to support projects focused on animal models or comparative studies relevant for understanding the social determinants of health and aging, and to generate key preliminary data future NIH grant applications, publications, and other scientific products. This year’s award recipients include Kristen Berendzen, Postdoctoral Scholar, UCSF who proposes to use the prairie vole, an animal that forms long term pair bonds, as a genetic model for examining the mechanistic link between social attachment and these diverse health outcomes. Amanda Dettmeyer, Associate Research Scientist at Yale University who will examine the influences of differing social environments early in life on biomarkers of inflammation in adulthood in rhesus macaques, with a particular focus on a novel biomarker of chronic inflammation, soluble urokinase plasminogen activator receptor (suPAR). Michael Sheehan, Nancy and Peter Meinig Family Investigator in the Life Sciences and Assistant Professor, Cornell University, who will examine the effects of costly status signaling on healthy aging in the lab and field enclosures, using the major urinary protein pheromones of house mice as a model system.