March Of Dimes Awards UA Biologist For His Birth Defect Research

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – The March of Dimes Birth Defects Foundation has named a University of Alabama biology professor a Basil O’Connor Scholar for his research related to children born with a “smooth-brain disease.”

Dr. Guy Caldwell, an assistant professor of biological sciences, was awarded $150,000 by the Foundation toward his research into this disease, known as lissencephaly. Caldwell is the only researcher in the Southeast named a Basil O’Connor Scholar by the March of Dimes.

Children born with lissencephaly have smooth brains rather than brains with multiple ridges and valleys. They suffer from severe mental retardation and epileptic seizures and often die by the age of two.

Caldwell, who joined UA’s biology faculty in August 1999 following post-doctoral training at Columbia University, uses a microscopic worm, known as C. elegans, in his research. The worm’s neurons use many of the same components, such as dopamine and other neurotransmitters, as do humans. The animal’s nervous system has been completely mapped and contains only 302 neurons, in contrast to the 100 billion neurons of the human brain. This makes it easier to trace the pathways of the worm’s neurons and to trace its protein functions within the neurons.

Lissencephaly, Caldwell said, occurs when the neurons in the brain are not properly migrating during early brain development. “The human gene that causes this disorder is unknown in how it functions,” he said. Because lissencephaly – and 50 percent of all human hereditary diseases – has been linked to genetic components also found in the worm, C. elegans could hold important answers in the treatment of the devastating disease, he said.

“By understanding where and when the gene is turned on and which other genes it interacts with in this animal, we can answer questions about how this gene functions,” Caldwell said. “Gaining an understanding of this disease at the molecular level is the first step toward drug therapy.” This research may also provide insights into other neurological disorders such as epilepsy, Alzheimer’s disease and tumors of the brain.

The Basil O’Connor award is named after the March of Dimes’ first chairman and president, according to the group’s web site. It was created in 1973 “to help some of the nation’s most promising young scientists commit to careers in birth defects research,” the site states. Previous winners include several Nobel Prize winners and the head of the National Human Genome Research Institute.