Today, UofL announced a five-year, $3 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to help fund the Green Heart project. The university also announced a $2 million grant from The Nature Conservancy to support the endeavor.

The Green Heart study will look at the connections between a green environment and human health. The institute will study air quality, innovative landscape design, the qualities of a friendly, healthy neighborhood and human health.

“The Green Heart project is the epitome of collaboration,” said UofL President Neeli Bendapudi, PhD. “Dr. Aruni Bhatnagar and his team are bringing together people from not only all of the university, but throughout Louisville and beyond to create a new paradigm for population research that truly has international implications.

“His creative thinking is leading to innovative public-private partnerships that eventually will lead to healthier communities.”

“People appreciate trees and they’re good and they’re aesthetically pleasing, but whether they actually have specific quantifiable health-promoting effects by removing pollutants from air has never been rigorously tested,” said Bhatnagar, director of the Envirome Institute and the Smith and Lucille Gibson Chair in Medicine. “Through the Green Heart project, we are changing that.”

More than half the world’s population resides in urban areas, which have higher than average levels of air pollution. Air pollution is a significant contributor to cardiovascular disease and is linked to 7 million premature deaths worldwide annually, 200,000 in the United States alone.

Bhatnagar and his team will include 16 low-vegetation neighborhood clusters in Louisville to examine the impact of urban greenery on their health. The researchers are recruiting 700 community participants within these 16 clusters for the study. The team will examine blood, urine and hair samples to assess cardiovascular health.

In eight of the clusters, the team and their partners will plant as many as 8,000 native trees of all sizes. Additionally, they will plant shrubbery and grasses to further optimize the ability to filter pollutants from the air.

Two years later, the researchers again will collect samples from the volunteers and analyze the differences. They also will compare the results to those from the participants in the eight neighborhood clusters that did not live in the areas that had the plantings.

“We believe that the greening of the neighborhoods will positively impact not only the air quality, but also the health of the people who live in those areas,” Bhatnagar said. “If we are correct, we may be able to create new strategies for the prevention of cardiovascular disease.

“The results of this project also will provide new insights into the effects of urban vegetation on community environment. These findings will be relevant to the development of new public health polices and the optimization of ongoing planting efforts in cities around the world to enhance public health.

The Green Heart Project is a collaborative initiative of the University of Louisville with Washington University in St. Louis; Cornell University, The Nature Conservancy, Hyphae Design Laboratory, the United States Forest Service and other partners. The grant from the National Institutes supports health evaluation of community participants, whereas the greening efforts are supported by the grant from The Nature Conservancy.

Check out highlights from today’s announcement: 

The UofL Cancer ����ֱ�� Program is an intensive summer research and professional development program for outstanding undergraduate and health professional students, supporting their pursuit of careers in cancer research.

The , funded by an R25 grant from the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health, accepts about 30 trainees each summer. The students engage in a 10-week research project under the guidance of UofL cancer researchers and lab mentors in basic, clinical, translational, behavioral and population-based cancer research. The mentors are research-intensive UofL faculty, most of whom are affiliated with the James Graham Brown Cancer Center.

This spring, the program was renewed for five years with the leadership addition of director LaCreis Kidd, PhD, MPH, associate professor and Our Highest Potential Endowed Chair in Cancer Research in the UofL Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology. David Hein, PhD, chair of the department, established the program and continues as director along with Kidd. More than 60 UofL faculty members serve as mentors and key contributors to the program.

“The renewal of this program is a clear indication that the trainees are excelling in cancer research during and after completion of the program. In addition, UofL and the James Graham Brown Cancer Center are providing cutting edge research, professional development and networking opportunities for the next generation of cancer research scientists,” Kidd said.

Since it began in 2012, the program has trained more than 150 students, including college undergraduates and medical, public health, dental and nursing students from more than 25 universities across the United States. More than one-third of the trainees have continued their studies as medical, doctoral and MD/PhD students at UofL. Others have continued their cancer research training at institutions such as Johns Hopkins University and Columbia. The five-year award of $1,593,000 supports the students’ research activities, subsistence payments, travel and housing.

To sharpen their professional skills, the trainees participate in engaging professional development activities. The activities include a 90-second elevator pitch contest, speed networking and public speaking activities that allow trainees to connect with their audience and deliver engaging oral presentations.

At the conclusion of the program, the students deliver their work in the form of research posters and oral presentations to faculty, judges and fellow students. Many of the students also present their research at as well as at regional, national and international scientific meetings. Research conducted in the program is frequently published with a student as first author.

“The NCI R25 Cancer ����ֱ�� Program is well poised to prepare the next generation of young investigators in the field of cancer research or clinical oncology,” Kidd said.

One goal of the UofL NCI Cancer ����ֱ�� Program is to reach underrepresented minorities for participation. Of the 156 students who have completed the program, 53 are underrepresented minority students.

The Cancer ����ֱ�� Program is integrated with other summer research activities on UofL’s Health Sciences Center campus, including the Summer Research Scholar Program for students in the School of Medicine and the School of Dentistry’s Summer Research Program.

UofL Training Program in Environmental Health Sciences renewed

Another training program at UofL, the Training Program in Environmental Health Sciences, was renewed for a 5-year term with a $2.4 million T32 grant in late 2016 by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. The program funds predoctoral and post-doctoral students on a full-time basis, incorporating numerous centers, institutes, schools and more than 50 faculty mentors to provide cutting edge basic, clinical, computational and population-based research.

Hein established this program in 2004 and served as principal director until 2016. With the program’s renewal, Gavin Arteel, PhD, professor and Distinguished University Scholar in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, took over as director. The Training Program in Environmental Health Sciences supports six predoctoral and three postdoctoral trainees. Graduates of the program have gone on to positions in the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration, the pharmaceutical industry, and as faculty members at UofL and other prestigious universities. Kevyn Merten, PhD, assistant vice president for research and innovation at UofL, was among the first graduates, completing the program in 2006.

“The grant renewal recognizes that the university supports a critical mass of research to support the training of students and postdoctoral associates in this area,” Arteel said. “Two very strong programs that we have are the Diabetes and Obesity Center and the Hepatobiology and Toxicology Program.”

Aruni Bhatnagar, Ph.D., Matthew Cave, M.D., and Hein serve as co-directors for the program.