Bryce is a doctoral candidate in Pharmacology, where he conducts his research in the labs of Jeffrey Saucerman and Matthew Wolf. He received his Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Physiology and Kinesiology from the University of Florida.
We asked Bryce to tell us about his research and hopes for the future:
Tell us about your research:
Adult mammalian cardiomyocytes have a limited proliferative capacity which prevents full recovery of the myocardium after traumatic heart injuries like a heart attack. My project looks at how dual-specificity tyrosine phosphorylation regulated kinase 1A (DYRK1A) regulates cardiomyocyte cell cycle activity and how its inhibition can promote endogenous cardiomyocyte proliferation. We have shown through a combination of computational and experimental methods the mechanisms by which small molecule inhibition of DYRK1A promotes cardiomyocyte cycling and improves cardiac function after an ischemic/reperfusion myocardial infarction (I/R MI). What is even more interesting is that DYRK1A inhibition only promotes cardiomyocyte cycling after I/R MI and not in healthy myocardium. This raises an exciting question about what is changing in the myocardium during MI that makes DYRK1A susceptible to inhibition to promote cardiomyocyte proliferation. Overall, the goal of my project is to understand how DYRK1A mediates cardiomyocyte cell cycle activity after injury.
What drives or motivates your scientific pursuits?
I have always been interested in how we could advance treatment for human disease. There is so much to learn and discover about combating human disease that I can’t imagine I would ever get bored!
What are your future goals?
I would like to pursue a career in industry, working on drug development projects that would hopefully impact human health. Although I would love to continue doing cardiovascular research, I would be happy working on anything that could really help people.