April 15, 2023

Dr. Ding’s NIH grant entitled “Volumetric imaging and computation to characterize cardiac electromechanical coupling” is funded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI).  Approximately 450,000 individuals in the United States die suddenly from cardiac arrhythmias every year. Many widely used medications such as antiarrhythmic agents, antimicrobials, anticancer drugs, and psychotropic drugs can cause or exacerbate a variety of arrhythmias. The ability to prospectively identify potentially arrhythmogenic compounds would be clinically valuable. Much remains unknown about the involved excitation-contraction coupling abnormalities and mechanisms of arrhythmias associated with specific drugs. For this reason, Dr. Ding seeks to integrate 4-dimensional (4D, 3D spatial + 1D temporal) volumetric imaging with computational model to investigate whether a common mechanism of action underlies drug-induced excitation-contraction coupling abnormalities. The success of this research will establish a new holistic strategy to in vivo investigate sophisticated electromechanical interaction, providing an entry point to further study the underlying mechanism of arrhythmias and prospectively identify arrhythmogenic compounds.