Professor David Kaye, the Head of the Heart Failure Research Group at Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute in Australia, wiil be delivering a seminar at Imperial College on Tuesday 25th August entitled ‘Regenerating the Failing Heart’. His presentation will take place at 12 noon in seminar room 120 in the Sir Alexander Fleming Building.
Research in Professor Kaye’s laboratory aims to find ways of stopping the deterioration of heart failure patients through a range of means – from better understanding the cellular, molecular and genetic underpinnings of the progression from initial heart muscle damage to heart failure, mechanisms involved in the process of heart failure itself, to large animal studies with immediate clinical relevance and the development of therapeutic devices to improve the lives of those living with the condition.
Projects underway in Professor Kaye’s Group include studies of cardiac hypertrophy (why it is beneficial to athletes but a harmful development in heart failure); the effects of diabetes on the muscle of the heart; the effects of the hormone relaxin on fibrotic heart tissue and the investigation of better cardiac surgical techniques.