UAMS researchers secure NIH grants for bone and cancer studies

Researchers at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) have secured two significant grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to advance medical studies in bone health and oncology.

Melda Onal, Ph.D., will lead a $2.4 million, five-year project investigating the mechanisms of bone loss. The study focuses on autophagy, an intracellular recycling process, to understand why bone formation declines during aging and in individuals with osteogenesis imperfecta, also known as brittle bone disease.

Separately, Fen Xia, M.D., Ph.D., and Brian Koss, Ph.D., have been awarded a $3.1 million NIH grant over five years. Their research, conducted through the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute, aims to enhance the immune system’s ability to combat tumor growth in head and neck cancers by studying DNA damage response and immune control.