Professor Julie Stenken, chemistry and biochemistry, has been awarded a two-year Exploratory Developmental Research Grant (R21) from the National Institutes of Health. The grant is titled “In Vivo Brain Dialysis of Neuropeptides and Neuroimmune Signaling Proteins.”

The $375,000 grant will help to develop analytical chemistry methods to collect and detect cytokine proteins to allow for rapid translational medical treatments for humans. Cytokines as well as other neuropeptides are known to affect different human diseases related to the brain including, but not limited to, alcoholism, anxiety, appetite, depression, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, pain, sleep, and various psychiatric disorders. These peptides and proteins are difficult to measure in the living brain.  

Stenken is a leading expert in the area of in vivo collection of cytokines using a technique called microdialysis sampling. 

“Having the ability to measure cytokines in mammalian brain will significantly improve the understanding and treatment of numerous neurological disorders,” Stenken said.

Nationial Institutes of Health R21 grants are meant to encourage high risk/high return research efforts. 

Stenken is the 21st Century Chair in Proteomics in the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences.