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chuang@mail.nih.gov
Ph.D. Molecular and Cellular Biology Program, State University of New York at Stony Brook, 1971.
Chief, Molecular Neurobiology Section, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health at Bethesda, Maryland.
Mechanisms and actions of mood-stabilizing drugs, and the mechanisms of apoptosis and its implications in neuropsychiatric and neurological diseases
Research goals: Investigation of the mechanisms and actions of mood-stabilizing drugs as well as the mechanisms of apoptosis and its implications in neuropsychiatric and neurological diseases.
Dr. Chuang's laboratory has provided the first evidence that the mood-stabilizer lithium robustly protects CNS neurons from glutamate-induced excitotoxicity. His group also identified potential mechanisms underlying lithium neuroprotection, which include inactivation of NMDA receptors, activation of cell survival pathways, up-regulation of anti-apoptotic genes, and down-regulation of pro-apoptotic genes. His team also demonstrated that lithium reduces brain damage in rodent models of stroke and a rat excitotoxic model of Huntington's disease. In addition, Dr. Chuang and his collaborators have documented that glyceraldehydes-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH), sometimes referred to as a house keeping gene, is in fact involved in the occurrence of neuronal apoptosis and could be linked to the pathogenesis of certain neurodegenerative diseases.
Dr. Chuang has received the NIH Director's Award in 1997, the 2002 NARSAD Distinguished Investigator Award, and was inducted into the Academia Sinica in Taiwan in 2006.
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