Dr Ashish Misra awarded $450,000 NSW Health Grant for atherosclerosis project

Congratulations to Dr Ashish Misra, who has been awarded a 2023 NSW Health Senior and Early-Mid Career Researcher Grant in the field of cardiovascular research.

Dr Misra, leader of HRI’s Atherosclerosis and Vascular Remodelling Unit, has been awarded a NSW EMCR grant for his project ‘Thickening the cap: a novel NOTCH3 mediated RNA therapy for atherosclerosis’.

Cardiovascular disease is responsible for one in four Australian deaths. Its underlying cause is atherosclerosis.

In atherosclerosis, plaques develop within arteries, become unstable and rupture, resulting in heart attacks and strokes.

“Despite being well known that stable plaques are less likely to rupture, there are currently no cell-based techniques to promote stability of plaques,” said Dr Misra, adding that the “gold standard treatment” for atherosclerosis, lipid lowering drugs like statins, has several limitations.

First, around half of patients do not respond to statins. Second, an inflammatory risk persists and is responsible for the occurrence of life-threatening cardiovascular events.

“As a result, novel cell-based therapies that can promote stability in unstable plaques without adverse effects and reduce risk of rupture are urgently needed.”