Converging to Connect Brain and Heart Diseases
From left: Felix E.Y. Aggor, Stephen Chan
In the past, an interdisciplinary team studying the link between brain and heart diseases would need a brain expert and a heart expert.
“We need both as well as bioengineers,” says Stephen Chan, Vitalant Professor of Vascular Medicine and director of Pitt’s Vascular Medicine Institute. “We also need computational biologists, epidemiologists, clinical trialists, and molecular scientists.” As well as an entrepreneur who gets involved from day one.
With a $14.3 million grant from the WoodNext Foundation, Chan convened such experts to understand the link between cardiovascular disease and dementia.
For Chan, this project also is an opportunity to reimagine how science is done. Historically the academic model has elevated the individual investigator, working alone. “Now we need to innovate on how to collaborate in positive ways— integrated ways—ways in which we can tackle important problems quickly and simultaneously from completely new and different angles,” he says.
That integration can be seen in the team’s “research pod” structure, wherein researchers from different backgrounds work together toward shared goals, allowing for an agility not found in traditional research configurations. In six months, they have discovered more about the nature of the brain-heart connection; found potential drugs; and started a clinical trial.
“The reason I came to Pitt seven years ago was to be a part of a community and to help to establish something bigger than myself. Pitt was built on the idea of working together to achieve those dreams.”