AREAS OF SPECIALTY:
Oxidative stress/redox
Sarcopenia/ muscle
Mitochondria
Holly Van Remmen, PhD
The central focus of my research is the impact of oxidative stress and mitochondrial function on aging and age related disease. My current studies focus on the role of oxidative stress in modulating the relationship between motor neurons and skeletal muscle in sarcopenia and on interventions to delay or reduce sarcopenia. I also have significant expertise in assays used to measure oxidative stress and damage, as evidenced by my role as Leader of the Geroscience Redox Biology Core in Oklahoma Nathan Shock Center. In addition to assays that measure oxidative damage in lipid, protein and DNA, my laboratory routinely measures mitochondrial function including production of reactive oxygen species, ATP generation and oxygen consumption in cells, tissues and in isolated mitochondrial preparations. I have many years of experience in generating, characterizing and maintaining colonies of genetically modified mouse models for longevity and healthspan studies and in studies of the neurodegenerative disease ALS. For more than 15 years, I have been working with number of mouse models with floxed alleles and I have significant expertise in generating and characterizing tissue specific knockout or transgenic mice using constitutive or inducible Cre expression. I am also well versed in muscle physiology and a number of healthspan measures in mice including grip strength, rotarod performance, nerve conduction assays and measures of spontaneous activity, in addition to assays of metabolism. I have published over 190 peer-reviewed manuscripts on my work. I have been funded by the NIA, a Julie Martin Mid-Career Award from the American Federation for Aging Research, a Senior Scholar Award from the Ellison Medical Foundation, the Muscular Dystrophy Association and the VA where I am a Senior Research Career Scientist. I was President of the American Aging Society in 2006-07 and am President-elect for this Society in 2022-23. I have served as the primary mentor for 10 trainees receiving Ph.D. degrees and 15 post-doctoral trainees. Two graduate students in my laboratory have been funded by F31 fellowship grants. Also, I have served as a mentor to 8 junior faculty (PhDs) holding K-awards or similar funding from the VA and am mentoring junior faculty in an NIH funded P20 CoBRE grant.