The department is composed of a multi-disciplinary team of investigators, fellow and staff with expertise in bioinformatics, cheminformatics, computational biology, systems biology, translational neurobiology, bioimaging, drug screening, image computing, medical informatics, and imaging physics. The BBP Core includes three interdisciplinary centers. The Ting Tsung and Wei Fong Chao Center for Bioinformatics Research and Imaging for Neurosciences (BRAIN), which is dedicated to advancing research in neurodegeneration; the Center for Bioengineering and Informatics (CBI), which focuses on developing novel approaches and tools to help erase cancer and cure diabetes and metabolic disease; and the Center for Modeling of Cancer Development (CMCD), an interdisciplinary research and training center of cancer systems biology funded by NCI in partnership with Baylor College of Medicine and the University of Texas School of Health Information Sciences with the goal of identifying protein markers for tumor initiating cells and surrounding cells as well as developing a simulation model for cancer development to use in treatment response prediction.

The cancer research program at TMHRI is one of the largest in Texas, with basic, clinical, and translational studies covering many types of cancer including breast, endometrial, genitourinary, and prostate.

The cardiovascular disease program at TMHRI focuses primarily on atherosclerosis, acute coronary syndromes, arrhythmia, atrial and ventricular fibrillation, and heart failure. Dr. Miguel Valderrabano and colleagues in the Optical Mapping Electrophysiology Research Laboratory are working on a novel method of cardiac stimulation and defibrillation that involves nanosecond megavolt pulse technology. Success will result in a new method of defibrillation that is more effective and less physically punishing. Dr. Dirar Khoury and his research team in the Experimental Cardiac Electrophysiology Laboratory are developing a catheter to measure the electrophysiological function of the heart. This innovative imaging system will be able to create clinically usable diagnostic models that novel treatments can be based on. Dr. Khoury’s research also includes molecular signaling pathways that could potentially be responsible for abnormal heart rhythms. Dr. Guillermo Torre-Amione and his research team in the Heart Failure Research Laboratory investigate the body’s immune response and subsequent inflammation and its contribute to the progression of chronic heart failure and novel immune modulatory therapies. Dr. Torre– Amione led the first two FDA–approved trials of Celacade, an outpatient procedure that aims to reduce inflammatory mediators in the patient’s blood, with impressive results. A Phase III trial is underway. Dr. Neal Kleiman and his research team in the Applied Platelet Physiology Laboratory investigate the multiple functional aspects of platelets, the signaling pathways that regulate them, and potential abnormalities and their response to therapies.

Diabetes currently affects some 21 million people in the United States, and its incident rate is on the rise. Understanding the mechanisms of obesity, insulin resistance, tissue damage, and islet cell dysfunction in diabetes is the main goal of Dr. Willa Hsueh and her research team in the Diabetes Research Center. Integrating novel imaging technologies and fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) with high-throughput gene array capabilities, the laboratory is conducting groundbreaking research into the human genetics of diabetes, the creation of new pre-clinical models for diabetes and other metabolic disorders, and the protective role of specific proteins in diabetes complications. The thyroid, a vital endocrine gland, secretes hormones that regulate metabolic rate, heart function, cholesterol, and triglyceride levels, among many other functions in the body. Understanding the gland and its hormones at the molecular level, and the signaling pathways associated with them, are necessary to develop effective, targeted therapies for metabolic disorders such as diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and hyperthyroidism. One of the goals of Dr. John Baxter and his research team in the Diabetes Research Center is to develop selective analogs that specifically elicit beneficial effects on metabolic parameters and body weight, in the absence of effects on heart rate. These compounds should represent novel treatments for obesity, and have the potential to reduce the risk of Type II diabetes.

Investigators in the Center are interested in many areas of contemporary infectious disease research, including molecular mechanisms of pathogenesis, human genetics of susceptibility to infectious agents, and vaccinology. We are interested in a diverse range of pathogens and the diseases they cause, including but not limited to group A Streptococcus, group B Streptococcus, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Staphylococcus aureus, and Vibrio cholerae. Our interdisciplinary research is performed in newly-renovated state-of-the-art facilities using genome-wide methods and high throughput technologies. Research Institute facilities include a biosafety level 3 laboratory, Affymetrix expression microarray stations, confocal microscopy, ABI sequencing capacity, outstanding imaging capacity, and Illumina, Solexa, and Luminex instruments, among many others. The Center is growing rapidly as we add new investigators and their research teams

The Department of Nanomedicine is a Programmatic Core co-directed by Drs. Paolo Decuzzi, Alessandro Grattoni, Jason Sakamoto, Rita Serda, and Ennio Tasciotti. The Department focuses on inter-disciplinary research to combine nanoengineering, mathematical modeling and biomedical sciences to develop nanotechnology enabled therapeutic and diagnostic platforms for combating diseases including cancer, cardiovascular diseases and infectious diseases.

Neurosciences research programs at TMHRI concentrate on investigations of amyotropic lateral sclerosis (ALS), Parkinson's Disease, medically refractory dystonia, stroke, primary brain tumors, and stuttering. Dr. Stanley Appel and colleagues in the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA) ALS Clinical Research Center of the Methodist Neurological Institute are conducting basic laboratory research as well as translational research in a clinical cohort of over 300 patients. Dr. Appel’s group has documented the importance of immune/inflammatory alterations in mouse models of ALS and is exploring how protective immunity could prevent motor neuron injury and cell death. Dr. Ericka Simpson’s research team is conducting several studies to determine the role of the body’s immune inflammatory response in the progression of the disease, as well as to test novel treatments. Dr. David Chiu and colleagues in the Eddy Scurlock Stroke Center are conducting clinical trials to investigate drugs and procedures for stroke prevention and treatment. Understanding how various cancers affect the DNA of brain cells is a major research interest of Dr. David Baskin and his team in the Neurosurgery Research Laboratory. Dr. Robert Grossman, a renowned neurosurgery pioneer, with his research colleagues in the Department of Neurosurgery, has conducted numerous clinical studies for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease. His current studies aim to develop quantitative measurements of muscle strength and movement to allow for more accurate evaluations of both disease progression and treatment efficacy.