Link to the original article published by Nadine A Yehya can be found here.

(SACRAMENTO) This year, six research teams won the 2^nd annual Reaching Across the Causeway award. The award recognizes and supports exceptional collaboration among researchers in the Schools of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine.

Each team will get a one-year support of up to $50,000. The funding goes to help in the planning, preparation and submission of applications for research grants. The medical and veterinary schools co-fund this award, supporting four team projects. This year, UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center and the Clinical and Translational Science Center (CTSC) joined to fund two more projects.

The winners

Each winning team has at least one School of Medicine and one School of Veterinary Medicine co-principal investigator. The four teams awarded by the schools include:

• Kermit Carraway and James Angelastro.

Carraway is a biochemist and cell and cancer biologist in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine. Angelastro is an associate professor in the Department of Molecular Biosciences. The project aims to verify how cell signaling contributes to the malignant properties of glioblastoma. The goal is to identify new and more effective treatments for this aggressive type of brain tumor.

• Resmi Ravindran and William Culp.

Ravindran is a pathologist and project scientist in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Sciences. Culp is a professor of surgical and radiological sciences in the veterinary school. The study aims to find new biomarkers of canine hepatocellular (liver) carcinoma that can aid in diagnosis and future treatments in both canines and humans.

• Hannah Savage and Derek Bays.

Savage is an assistant professor of pathology, microbiology and immunology in the School of Veterinary Medicine. Bays is an assistant clinical professor of infectious diseases in the School of Medicine. Their team will investigate the effectiveness of drugs that restore the anaerobic environment of the gastrointestinal tract of patients receiving treatment for leukemia to discover if this will prevent invasive candidiasis (thrush) in these patients.

• Sara Thomasy and Ala Moshiri.

Thomasy is a professor in the Department of Surgical and Radiological Sciences and the Department of Ophthalmology and Vision Science. Moshiri is a professor of ophthalmology and vision science. The study will test the sight-restoring potential of an optogenetic treatment on dogs. It will also facilitate the treatment’s translation from preclinical models to human clinical trials for patients with retinal diseases.

The cancer center will fund:

• Jinhwan Kim and Jessica Lawrence.

Kim is an assistant professor of biomedical engineering and surgery. Lawrence is a professor of surgical and radiological sciences. The team will conduct a novel cell therapy approach to treating soft tissue sarcoma in both mouse models and through clinical trials in dogs.

The CTSC will fund:

• Tarini Ullal and Valentina Medici. Ullal is a staff faculty veterinarian of small animal internal, Medici is a professor of gastroenterology and hepatology. The team will evaluate serum samples from dogs with copper-associated hepatopathy and humans with Wilson disease. Their study seeks to establish biomarkers that improve non-invasive diagnosis and monitoring of both dogs and humans with copper-associated liver diseases.