Four UT-Houston Scientists Awarded Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board Grants

Four researchers at The University of Texas Medical School at Houston were awarded a total of almost a million dollars in grants recently by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.

Drs. Agnes Schonbrunn, M. Neal Waxham, Sudhir Paul, and Yong-Jian Geng will each use their grants to pursue research in their chosen fields.

Dr. Schonbrunn, a professor of integrative biology and pharmacology, received $275,000 from the coordinating board for her work developing antibodies for tumor diagnosis.

Dr. Waxham, an associate professor of neurobiology and anatomy, received $141,806. He is attempting to develop a microscope capable of quantifying intracellular diffusion.

Dr. Paul, a pathology and laboratory medicine professor and director of the Chemical Immunology Research Center, received $300,000 to continue his search for a chemical vaccination against HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Dr. Geng, an assistant professor of internal medicine-cardiology, received $200,000. Dr. Geng’s research focuses on myocardial infarctions, commonly known as heart attacks. He is currently studying the effects of transplanting bone marrow stem cells into dogs whose hearts have experienced infarctions, in an effort to help the heart recover.

"These grants to four of our faculty confirm the high quality and importance of their research and, in fact, the high caliber of research ongoing at the UT-Houston Medical School," said Dr. Maximilian Buja, dean of the medical school. "Their research holds great promise for advancing our basic understanding of human biology and improving the health of our citizens."

This year, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board awarded more than $61 million to 402 faculty members at 36 Texas state colleges and universities.

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©2006 Texas Medical Center

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