Elizabeth
G. Nabel, M.D
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Director
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
Chief and Principal
Investigator
The
Nabel Lab: Cardiovascular Branch,
Vascular Biology Section
NHLBI Division of Intramural
Research
Director's Office |
Elizabeth G. Nabel, Director of the National
Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI)
of the National Institutes of Health, joined
the NHLBI in September 1999 as the Institute
Scientific Director of Clinical Research.
Dr. Nabel is a board-certified cardiologist
who has taken care of many patients with
cardiovascular disease, including women
with heart disease. Previously she had been
Chief, Division of Cardiology, Director,
Cardiovascular
Research Center, and Professor of Internal
Medicine and Physiology at the University
of Michigan.
A
native of Minneapolis, Minnesota, Dr. Nabel
received her medical education
at Cornell University Medical College
before
moving to Brigham and Women Hospital
and Harvard University where she completed
an internship and residency in internal
medicine and a clinical and research
fellowship
in cardiovascular medicine.
She joined
the faculty at the University of Michigan
in 1987 as an Assistant Professor of
Medicine and rose through the ranks,
becoming Director
of the Cardiovascular Research Center
in 1992, Professor of Internal Medicine
and
Physiology in 1994, and Director of
the Division of Cardiology in 1997. While
at the University of Michigan, she
became
known for her research in the field
of vascular biology and molecular cardiology
and for her gene transfer studies of
the
cardiovascular system.
Dr. Nabel has had a longstanding interest
in genetic and cellular therapies for
cardiovascular disease, having developed
techniques for
the introduction and expression of
recombinant genes into blood vessels in
vivo. Her
group has conducted a number of basic
studies,
investigating the expression and function
of growth factor, cytokine, and cell
cycle genes in the vasculature. Those
studies
led to several clinical gene therapy
trials of cardiovascular diseases in
the United
States and Europe.
Dr. Nabel has intertwined basic research
and translation to clinical medicine and
practice throughout her career and has
championed the concept of “bench
to bedside.” Her current research
interests are focused on the regulation
of vascular growth and the molecular genetics
of vascular diseases. Dr. Nabel has investigated
the regulation of smooth muscle cell growth
by cell cycle regulatory proteins, a process
important for the development of atherosclerosis
and restenosis.
Her Vascular Biology Lab
at the NIH has characterized the role
of the cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitors
on vascular proliferation, inflammation,
and progenitor cells using a variety
of
genetic tools. The inhibitors are important
negative regulators of vascular smooth
muscle cell growth and vascular inflammation,
and work from her lab has opened up new
avenues for therapeutic targets in the
vasculature. She is also conducting clinical
studies examining genomics and proteomics
in vascular diseases, such as one study
of in-stent restenosis. The Vascular
Biology Lab has published more than 200
papers
and Dr. Nabel has mentored 42 students
and fellows associated with her lab. Dr. Nabel has received numerous awards,
including the Distinguished Achievement
Award from the Basic Cardiovascular Sciences
Council of the American Heart Association
and the Amgen-Scientific Achievement
Award from the American Society for Biochemistry
and Molecular Biology. She is an elected
member of the American Society of Clinical
Investigation, the Association of American
Physicians, and the Institute of Medicine
of the National Academy of Sciences.
In
2001, Dr. Nabel received an honorary
doctoral degree from the University of
Leuven, Leuven,
Belgium.
Dr. Nabel is an editorial board member
of The New England Journal of Medicine.
She has been a reviewing editor for
Science and an editorial board member of
the
Journal of Clinical Investigation.
She also served
as a consulting editor for Circulation,
Circulation Research, and Arteriosclerosis,
Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology.
Dr. Nabel has served on American Heart
Association committees, including
the Board of Directors; the Scientific
Publishing Committee (Chair); the
Atherosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular
Biology Council
(Chair); the executive committee
of the
Basic Cardiovascular Sciences Council;
and the Science Advisory and Coordinating
Committee.
Other national and international
leadership roles include President
of the
North American Vascular Biology
Organization, Councilor of the American
Society
of Clinical Investigation, member of
the Board of Directors
for the Keystone Symposium, member
of the Scientific Advisory Board
of
The
Stanley
J. Sarnoff Endowment for Cardiovascular
Science, and member of the membership
committee of the Institutes of
Medicine. She has
also served on international advisory
committees including the Center
for Transgene Technology
and Gene Therapy and the Center
for Molecular and Vascular Biology at
the University
of Leuven, and the International
Vascular Biology Organization.
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