Dr. Stefan Worgall, Distinguished Professor of Pediatric Pulmonology and Division Chief of the Pediatric Pulmonology, Allergy and Immunology at Weill Cornell Medicine and has been awarded an R01 by the National Institute of Health for his study, “Respiratory sphingolipid synthesis involved in airway hyperreactivity and viral-triggered asthma.”
For years, researchers have studied the genetic factors that contribute to childhood asthma, a disease that affects millions of children worldwide. Through their research, they have discovered that changes in sphingolipid production may play a key role in the development of asthma. The researchers have found that children with asthma have decreased sphingolipid synthesis, especially in the presence of common asthma risk genotypes. They have also found that rhinovirus , the most common trigger for asthma attacks in children, may further impair sphingolipid synthesis.
In this study, Dr. Worgall and his team of researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine with collaborators at Columbia and Harvard University plan to study the effects of rhinovirus on sphingolipid synthesis in children with asthma and in airway epithelial cells to better understand the link between sphingolipids and asthma attacks. This research could lead to groundbreaking discoveries in better understanding the mechanisms of asthma and provide targets for therapies to help children suffering from this disease.