Recently a research team in the Department of Nutrition, Food and Exercise Sciences was awarded seed funding from the FSU Office of Research through the Collaborative Collision: COVID-19 Pandemic call for proposals. Their project is entitled “Understanding genetic, pharmaceutical and environmental factors increasing risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection,” and involves a collaborative effort between four investigators. The lead PI Dr. Parvatiyar and co-PIs Drs. Hyun Seok Hwang, Gloria Salazar and Isela Valera will provide their unique expertise to this project. SARS-CoV-2 targets the ACE2 receptor to infect human host tissues. Therefore, experiments will examine a genetic risk factor that increases angiotensi
n-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) expression in the heart, which may increase viral load and myocarditis risk. In addition, environmental risk factors and commonly administered pharmaceuticals will be assessed to determine whether they contribute to adverse outcomes in Covid-19 patients.
More on FSU’s Collaborative Collision as it relates to COVID-19 can be found here