NIH invests $46 million in technologies to monitor placental health
The National Institutes of Health has announced $46 million in research awards for the Human Placenta Project, an initiative to revolutionize understanding of the placenta. The awards will fund technology development and testing to assess placental function throughout pregnancy, with the ultimate goal of improving pregnancy outcomes and lifelong health.
"People usually take the placenta for granted. But when it doesn't work the way it should, it can put the entire pregnancy at risk—along with the health of mother and fetus," said Catherine Spong, M.D., deputy director of NIH's Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, which is leading the initiative.
The placenta is a critical organ that shuttles blood, oxygen, and nutrients from mother to fetus and clears harmful waste like carbon dioxide. It also produces hormones to help sustain the pregnancy and regulate the immune system so that mother and fetus can coexist.
Many problems of pregnancy—such as preeclampsia, preterm birth, and even stillbirth—can occur because of problems with the placenta. If researchers can develop tools to monitor the placenta from the earliest stages of pregnancy, physicians may one day be able to identify problems sooner and intervene more quickly.
"As essential as it is, there's still so much we don't know about the placenta," said Dr. Spong. "The good news is that science has advanced to such a degree that we have a better opportunity than ever before to learn how the placenta works. That knowledge may one day help improve clinical care."
NIH has funded 19 projects, totaling approximately $46 million in this fiscal year. The awards will support development of safe, noninvasive methods to monitor the placenta in real time, throughout all stages of pregnancy. The funds also will support research on environmental factors that may affect placental function (see the U01 awards below).
The awardees are:
Albert Einstein College of Medicine/Montefiore Health System, New York CityDr. Zev Williams (1R01HD086327-01)
Children's Hospital Corporation, BostonDr. Patricia Ellen Grant (1U01HD087211-01)
Eastern Virginia Medical School, NorfolkDr. Alfred Z. Abuhamad (1R01HD086313-01)
Hackensack University Medical Center, Hackensack, New Jersey Dr. Stacy Zamudio (1U01HD087209-01)
The Hospital for Sick Children, TorontoDr. John G. Sled (1U01HD087177-01)
King's College London Dr. Mary Rutherford (1U01HD087202-01)
Magee-Womens Research Institute and Foundation, PittsburghDr. Yoel Sadovsky (1R01HD086325-01)
Oregon Health and Science University, PortlandDr. Antonio E. Frias (1R01HD086331-01; 1U01HD087182-01)
Stanford University, Stanford, California Dr. Jeremy Dahl (1R01HD086252-01)Dr. Virginia D. Winn (1R21HD086253-01)
University of California, Los AngelesDr. Sherin U. Devaskar (1U01HD087221-01)
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Dr. Nadav Schwartz (1U01HD087180-01)
University of South Florida, TampaDr. Anthony O. Odibo (1U01HD087213-01)
University of Western Ontario, LondonDr. Charles A. McKenzie (1U01HD087181-01)
University of Wisconsin-MadisonDr. Dinesh Manilal Shah (1U01HD087216-01)
Virginia Commonwealth University, RichmondDr. Charles E. Chalfant (1U01HD087198-01)
Wake Forest University Health Sciences, Winston-Salem, North CarolinaDr. Liliya M. Yamaleyeva (1R21HD086357-01)
Washington University in St. LouisDr. Joel Richard Garbow (1R01HD086323-01)
The Human Placenta Project receives additional support from the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering. For more information, please visit http://www.nichd.nih.gov/hpp.
Provided by NIH/Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
