September 2025 News and Publications

Contracts and Grants:

Robert Bloch, PhD, Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was awarded a 3-year grant from Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA)

Robert Bloch, PhD, Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was awarded a renewal on their grant from the Jain Foundation

Vivek Garg, PhD, Assistant Professor, was awarded a grant from MSCRF

Brian Herb, PhD, Research Associate, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was awarded an R01 from NIDA

Tom Longden, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was awarded an R21 from NINDS

Jessica Mong, PhD, Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was awarded a T32 for 5 Years – Total $1.2m

Vincent Njar, PhD, Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was awarded the Isoprene's 2-year $2M Direct-to-Phase II award

Alexandros Poulopoulos, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, received the NIH Targeted challenge award - Total $250k

Matt Trudeau, PhD, Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, and Megan Rizzo, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, were awarded a 5-year T32 from NIGMS

Owen Woodward, PhD, Associate Professor Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was awarded a sponsored research agreement with Helex Inc.

Owen Woodward, PhD, Associate Professor Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was awarded a sponsored research agreement with Gondola Bio Service Co. Inc.

Presentations, Events, Lectures & Workshops: 

Aaron Levy, PhD, Research Associate, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, presented an invited talk at the Excitatory Synapses and Brain Function Gordon Research Conference, held in Manchester, NH, in early June. The title of his talk was "Synaptic Nanoarchitecture Regulates NMDA Receptor Activation".

Publications:

Daniel Bergman, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, was first author of "Human interpretable grammar encodes multicellular systems biology models to democratize virtual cell laboratories," which published in Cell on August 21, 2025.

Guiling Zhao, PhD, Assistant Professor and W. Jonathan Lederer, MD, PhD, Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology were co-authors of "Microtubule-Dependent Ca2+ Spark Recruitment in the Heart (Editorial)" that was published in J Am Heart Assoc. on Aug 29. 2025.

Guiling Zhao, PhD, Assistant Professor and W. Jonathan Lederer, MD, PhD, Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology were co-authors of "Pericytes in mouse heart" that was published in Front. Physiol. on July 29 2025.

Aaron Levy, PhD, Research Associate, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, and Thomas Blanpied, PhD, Professor and Vice-Chair,  Department of Pharmacology and Physiology, were co-corresponding authors of "Trans-synaptic context of NMDA receptor nanodomains", which was published in Nature Communications on August 12, 2025.