Table 8: Basic Science Grantsmanship

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Shannon Bainbridge, PhD

What is Your Current Position?

Shannon Bainbridge is an assistant professor in the Interdisciplinary School of Health Sciences, with cross appointment to the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine and affiliate investigator status at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute (OHRI).

What are your current research endeavors and/or other academic contributions?

She obtained her Ph.D. from Queen’s University (Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology) with a dissertation that focused on the effects of maternal smoking during pregnancy. Professor Bainbridge went on to complete two post-doctoral fellowships, the first at Magee-Womens Research Institute (Pittsburgh, PA) and the second at the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute at Mount Sinai Hospital (Toronto, ON). In both fellowships her research examined how different biological and genetic influences affect early placental development in the context of both healthy and pathological pregnancies.  

Professor Bainbridge’s current research program addresses two common and debilitating complications of pregnancy, preeclampsia and intrauterine growth restriction. The aims of her research program are to: 1) understand the molecular basis of these complications within the placenta; 2) identify molecular subclasses of these complications; 3) identify unique biomarkers that can be used to screen and identify these different subclasses of disease; 4) identify molecular candidates within the placenta that can be targeted for tailored therapeutic treatment of the different subclasses of disease. Methodology used within her laboratory includes gene and protein analysis, in vitro cell/tissue culture and in vivo models.

 

Ian Bird, PhD

What is Your Current Position?

My appointment is as Tenured Research Faculty. I am also Vice Chair Research,and Director Reproductive Science Division, Dept OBGyn. I am Director of the Endocrinology Reproductive Physiology Program (http://www.erp.wisc.edu/) and Past Secretary-Treasurer and Past President Perinatal Research Society (http://perinatalresearchsociety.org/wordpress/). In all these roles I have served both as Research Mentor and as Research Advisor.

What are your current research endeavors and/or other academic contributions?

My main area of funded research is mechanisms of endothelial adaptation to pregnancy and how it fails in preeclampsia. More specifically, the cellular changes that occur in increasing endothelial cell function and how the hormones of inflammation wounding seen in preeclampsia signal to inhibit Ca2+ signaling and vasodilator production and long-term serve to break down endothelial monolayer integrity.

What has been the most pivotal moment in your career?

The day we discovered CLA may be a new treatment for preeclampsia.

What is one piece of advice you would give to a trainee?

1. Understand the difference between a mentor and an advisor.
2. Understand you write a grant for the reviewer, not for you. 

 

Stacy Zamudio, PhD

What is Your Current Position?

Adjunct Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine and Community Health Rutgers-New Jersey Medical School

What are your current research endeavors and/or other academic contributions?

Dr. Zamudio has published over 80 articles on maternal and fetal physiology, genetics, epidemiology, and clinical outcomes. She studies what goes wrong with the placenta in pregnancies with complications like placenta accreta and preeclampsia. Her work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation, the American Heart Association and the Fogarty International Research Collaborative. She is a leader in the field, serving or having served on 3 scientific journal editorial boards, the Council of the Society for Reproductive Investigation, President of the Perinatal Research Society and as Chair of the NIH Obstetrics and Maternal-Fetal Biology study section (OMFB). OMFB evaluates training grants in reproductive biology/medicine, clinical trials, and transition to independence award for junior faculty. In this capacity Dr. Zamudio helps to shape the future of research in obstetrics and gynecology and the next generation of scientists.