Department of Biochemistry

More than a decade after the anti-inflammatory drugs Vioxx and Bextra were pulled from the market because of a heightened risk of heart attack and stroke in some patients, COX-2 inhibitors may be on the verge of a comeback, this time as anti-cancer agents.

Kamakoti “Kami” Bhat, a fifth-year graduate student in the lab of David Cortez, Ph.D., professor of Biochemistry in the School of Medicine, has achieved a “first” for Vanderbilt University.

Vanderbilt researchers have determined that a previously uncharacterized protein responds to DNA replication stress and has an essential role in maintaining the integrity of the genome.

An imaging probe developed at Vanderbilt detects retinal inflammation early and may allow therapeutic intervention to prevent blindness.

The discoveries that can change the course of human health forever often begin in the tiniest places: in molecules and cells, at the most fundamental intersection of physics, chemistry and biology. Understanding how these cellular and molecular processes work is the focus of basic biomedical research at Vanderbilt.

A research team led by structural biologists from Vanderbilt University has come up with the first detailed molecular explanation for a factor that may contribute to the so-called cystic fibrosis (CF) “gender gap.”

Vanderbilt researchers developed a new algorithm to find clinically targetable gene rearrangements in cancers.