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RESEARCH GROUPS
Group 28
Programme: Acute Lung Injury (ALI)
Lead Researcher: Pérez Vizcaíno, Francisco Group members
STAFF MEMBERS: Barreira Barba, Bianca | Martínez Ramas, Andrea | Moreno Gutiérrez, Laura . ASSOCIATED MEMBERS: Cogolludo Torralba, Ángel Luis | Morales Cano, Daniel
Main lines of research
Pulmonary hypertension is a condition characterized by increased pulmonary vascular resistance with a complex and not well characterized pathophysiology . Our interest is mainly focused on the mechanisms involved in pulmonary vasodilation and inhibition of cell proliferation in order to identify and design new drugs that are potentially useful in the treatment of pulmonary hypertension .
Acute lung injury (ALI ) or its more severe form, acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS ) is characterized by pulmonary edema and alveolar collapse leading to severe arterial hypoxemia . Although the protective ventilatory support strategies have improved the prognosis of patients, the associated mortality remains unacceptably high . Our interest is to characterizie the pulmonary vascular inflammatory response associated with acute lung injury and the identification of therapeutic targets to improve prognosis in these patients . Our research work is focused in analyzing different signaling pathways involved in these pathologies: 1) Sphingolipids, components of the plasma membrane of all eukaryotic cells whose hydrolysis products (ceramides and sphingosine) play a key role in various signal transduction pathways . 2) Innate immunity receptors and danger-associated molecular patterns .
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