The RSNA Research and Education (R&E) Foundation has awarded its 2019 Canon Medical Systems USA/RSNA research grants.
Dr. Eric James Hohenwalter of the Medical College of Wisconsin has received the Canon Medical Systems USA/RSNA Research Seed Grant. The 2019 Canon Medical Systems USA/RSNA Research Resident Grants have been awarded to Dr. Aaron Benjamin Simon, PhD, of the University of California, San Diego, and Dr. Arash Nazeri of Washington University.
As the winner of the research seed grant, Hohenwalter will receive $40,000 for a one-year project to test hypotheses and obtain pilot data in preparation for major grant applications. He, along with scientific advisors Drs. Sarah White and Kaila Redifer Tremblay, will study the immediate impact of transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunts creation on cardiac function by prospectively obtaining invasive perioperative measurements.
The research resident grants provide $30,000 for one year to residents to devote 50% of their time to a research project under the guidance of a scientific advisor. Nazeri, along with scientific advisor Hong Chen, PhD, will investigate whether focal transient opening of the blood-brain barrier using focused ultrasound can help to release abnormal protein aggregates -- the pathological hallmarks of frontotemporal lobar degeneration subtypes -- from the brain to the circulating blood in animal models. This technique could ultimately be used for space/time-resolved liquid biopsy and accurate noninvasive diagnosis of complex neurodegenerative disorders, Canon and the RSNA said.
Meanwhile, Simon will investigate whether early changes in blood flow to arteriovenous malformations after treatment with stereotactic radiosurgery -- as measured with 4D flow MRI -- are predictive of eventual angiographic obliteration. This method, if successful, could enable physicians to predict treatment success months to even years earlier than current techniques, Canon and the RSNA said.
