Anna Misior

Fourth Year Student, 2004-Present

Email address: amisior@wfubmc.edu

Education:

BS (Biology/Chemistry), 2001; Mars Hill College, Mars Hill, NC

Certified Clinical Research Coordinator, 2002-2006; ACRP

Current Research:

During my first rotation in Dr. Liwu Li’s laboratory, I worked on finding novel gene targets of IRAK1 and IRAK4, kinases involved in the activation of innate immunity.

Currently I am working in the laboratory of Dr. Raymond Penn at the Center for Human Genomics.  My project’s aim is to characterize intracellular signaling events which regulate growth of human airway smooth muscle cells in response to inflammation and relevant pharmacological agents (primarily corticosteroids and COX-2 inhibitors).  Increased growth of airway smooth muscle is observed in asthma and is thought to be one of the major contributors to tissue remodeling, which in turn drives disease severity and progression.  Currently there are no treatments which address these changes and understanding of the signaling events underlying the remodeling is limited.

Awards and Honors:

2008                 Wake Forest University Alumni Student Travel Award

                        Wake Forest University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

To attend the Annual American Thoracic Society Meeting and Scientific Sessions in Toronto, Canada, May 2008

2008                 ST*AR Award from American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology
                        AAAAI Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, PA, March 2008

2007                 Molecular Medicine Program Student Travel Award

                        Wake Forest University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

To attend the Annual American Thoracic Society Meeting and Scientific Sessions in San Francisco, CA, May 18-23, 2007

Abstracts, Presentations and Publications:

Misior A, Yan H, Pascual R, Deshpande D, Panettieri R, Penn R. Mitogenic effects of cytokines on smooth muscle are critically dependent on protein kinase A and are unmasked by steroids and cyclooxygenase inhibitors.  Mol Pharmacol. 2007 Nov 9 [Epub ahead of print]

Misior A, Yan H, Pascual R, Penn R. Protein kinase A (PKA) inhibition renders interleukin 1 Beta (IL-1β) pro-mitogenic to human airway smooth muscle (ASM) cells. 2008 Annual American Thoracic Society Meeting, San Francisco, CA.  May 20^th, 2007.

Huang Y, Misior A, Li L.  Novel role and regulation of the interleukin-1 receptor associated kinase (IRAK) family proteins.  Cell Mol Immun.  Feb 2005. 2(1): 36-39.

Li L, Huang Y, Misior A. IRAK1 serves as a novel nuclear regulator essential for LPS-induced Stat3 activation and IL-10 gene expression (abstract).  FASEB J. 2005, 19(4 Pt I): A920.