Summary
Dayue Darrel Duan, M.D., Ph.D., FAHA, is a Professor of Pharmacology and Principle Investigator of the Laboratory of Cardiac and Vascular Phenomics in the Center for Molecular Medicine at the School of Medicine University of Nevada in Reno (UNR), Nevada. Following the completion of his Ph.D. training with Dr. Stanley Nattel in Montreal Heart Institute and McGill University in 1996, Dr. Duan joined the lab of Dr. Joseph R. Hume, a world-leader in cardiovascular ion channels and electrophysiology, with a Canadian MRC postdoctoral fellowship. Dr. Duan became a faculty of UNR as a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Physiology and Cell Biology in 1998 and rose to an Associate Professor rank in 1999. Dr. Duan was appointed Associate Professor in 2001, tenured Associate Professor in 2005 and Professor in 2009 in the Department of Pharmacology at UNR. In his 30 years of research and study in cardiovascular field Dr. Duan discovered several anion channels in the heart and has made significant original contributions to the study of biophysics, physiology, pharmacology, and molecular biology of ion channels in the cardiovascular system. His current research focuses on the phenomics of ion channels in the cardiac and vascular systems. The Duan laboratory has been being continuously supported by research grants from NIH, American Heart Association (AHA), and American Diabetes Association. His laboratory has established several animal models for cardiac diseases and hypertension and has the capacity to study the genome-phenome relationship and molecular mechanisms for cardio- and cerebrovascular disease at multiple levels ranging from whole animal to molecular levels. He delivered over 100 invited lectures worldwide. He is currently a member of the Editorial Board of numerous journals, Associate Editor of Acta Pharmacologica Sinica and Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Clinical & Experimental Cardiology.
Research
The long-term goal of Dr. Duan's Laboratory of Cardiac and Vascular Phenomics is to determine the molecular mechanisms for the functional role of ion channels in the cardiac and vascular diseases. Ion channels play significant roles in cardiac electrical activity and contractile function. In addition, ion channels are important regulators of acidification of intracellular organelles, cell volume, proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis. Ion channels interact with many partners and function as an integrated "ion channel module" or "channel protein complex". Under pathological conditions "ion channel modules" often undergo remodeling and provide substrates for cardiovascular disease such as cardiac rhythm and contraction disorders and hypertension. Therefore, the systematical study of ion channels has important significance in the translational medicine for the prevention and treatment of cardiac and vascular diseases.
Chloride (Cl-) channels in the cardiovascular system, including the PKA- and PKC-activated CFTR Cl- channels, the volume-regulated outwardly rectifying ClC-3 and inwardly rectifying ClC-2 Cl- channels, the Ca2+-activated TMEM16 (Bestrophin and CLAC) Cl- channels, represent new targets for therapeutic agents against heart diseases. To gain mechanistic insights into the functional role of these ion channels in the context of health and disease the Duan laboratory has successfully established several animal models for cardiac diseases and hypertension and has the capacity to study the phenome-genome-proteome relationship and molecular mechanisms for cardiovascular disease at multiple levels of the whole-animal, the isolated organ, the tissue, the cell, and the molecule. The technology platforms used in the Duan laboratory include patch-clamp, molecular biology, genetics, genomics, proteomics, conditional systems for gene targeting and addition, isolated heart perfusion system, echocardiography, and radiotelemetry system.
Education
- M.D., 1982, Hunan Medical University, Medicine
- M.Sc., 1987, Sun Yat-Sen University of Medical Sciences, Pharmacology
- Ph.D., 1996, McGill University, Biomedical Sciences