Richard Martin
Iowa State University, IA·Pharmacology
Filarial diseases are tropical infections caused by parasitic worms spread by biting insects. They include lymphatic filariasis, caused by Brugia malayi, which affects 120 million people and can cause severe swelling and disfigurement, and river blindness, caused by Onchocerca volvulus.
- Fields
Pharmacology
Physiology
Microbiology & Immunology
- Topics
filariasis
river blindness
onchocerciasis
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2031
What they work on
- Measure whether emodepside potently activates KCNMA1, the human BK potassium channel, in HEK293 and CHO cell lines using whole-cell patch-clamp, to judge its potential for side effects.
- Analyze single-channel recordings of Brugia malayi and Onchocerca volvulus SLO-1 channels in HEK293 cells to learn how emodepside and the potentiator GoSlo-SR-5-69 open them.
- Test whether miconazole relatives such as clotrimazole, fluconazole, ketoconazole and itraconazole immobilize adult Brugia malayi, measured with the Worminator, and activate TRP-2 currents in worm muscle cells.
- Express Brugia TRP-2 channels in HEK293 cells and use the calcium dye Fluo-3AM to compare their sensitivity to drugs that act on human TRPC4/5 channels.
More about the research
With no effective vaccine, control depends on mass drug administration with a small set of anti-worm drugs (anthelmintics), and these face limits in effectiveness and safety as well as concerns about resistance. Better drugs, or better drug combinations, are needed.
Why it matters
People at risk of lymphatic filariasis and river blindness rely on a few drugs with safety limits and possible resistance. Understanding how emodepside, diethylcarbamazine and miconazole-like compounds act on worm channels versus human ones could support safer, lower-dose drug combinations and new TRP-2-targeting drugs for mass treatment programs.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Makedonka Mitreva
Washington University in St Louis, MO·Microbiology & Immunology
Track the reproducing adult female Wuchereria bancrofti worms over time by reconstructing sibling relationships among larvae (microfilariae) from repeated blood samples, using whole-genome sequencing of single larvae.
Conor McClenaghan
Rutgers University-New Brunswick, NJ·Pharmacology
Develop engineered split-SUR2 subunits, protein pieces of the KATP channel's regulatory partner, that can reassemble and restore ATP-sensitive potassium channel function in vivo, using protein engineering and patch clamp recordings.
Radha Kalluri
University of Southern California, CA·Neuroscience
Test whether the mix of ion channels in vestibular ganglion neurons explains their regular versus irregular firing, using patch-clamp recordings combined with single-cell labeling of dendrite shape in semi-intact inner-ear tissue.
The school
Iowa State University: 23 labs on PI Pages, $462M a year on research, 327 research doctorates a year.
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