Kleinman Receives Research to Prevent Blindness Career Development Award
LEXINGTON, Ky. (Jan. 7, 2013) − Dr. Mark Kleinman, assistant professor in the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences at the University of Kentucky College of Medicine, has received a Research to Prevent Blindness (RPB) Career Development Award. RPB Career Development Awards help recruit young doctors and scientists to eye research and support promising junior ophthalmology faculty.
The $250,000 grant will be released over a period of four years beginning this January and will fund studies on the role of epigenetic regulation of inflammatory gene expression in age-related macular degeneration, a blinding disease that affects between 30 and 50 million individuals worldwide. Kleinman’s laboratory of ocular biology and imaging was established in 2011 to investigate critical pathways of immune mediated inflammation in the eye with an emphasis on the development of novel disease biomarker imaging technologies.
For the planned work, Kleinman will use state-of-the-art molecular biology techniques including next-generation gene sequencing and mass-spectrometry based proteomics. Dr. Jayakrishna Ambati, professor of Physiology and professor and vice chair of ophthalmology and visual sciences at the UK College of Medicine, will serve as a primary mentor during the award period.
Since it was founded in 1960, RPB has provided hundreds of millions of dollars for vision research at medical institutions throughout the United States. As a result, RPB has been identified with nearly every major breakthrough in eye research during that time. Visit www.rpbusa.org for more on RPB's grants program and research developments.
Media Contact: Ann Blackford at (859) 323-6442 or ann.blackford@uky.edu
