Elizabethtown College faculty member awarded $1.1 million grant from National Institutes of Health

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Associate Professor of Biology Diane Bridge (standing) and Rebecca Holler '09, former student researcher and now Elizabethtown College alumna

ELIZABETHTOWN, PA (10/21/2010)(readMedia)-- A team of researchers including Elizabethtown College faculty member Diane Bridge was awarded a $1.1 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to study the biology of aging. The grant -- which continues a longtime partnership between Bridge and Daniel Martinez, chair of the Department of Biology at Pomona College in Claremont, Calif. -- will provide stipends for student researchers and funds for laboratory equipment and supplies over the next five years.

Like Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León, Bridge and her Pomona College collaborator are looking for biological secrets to human longevity. Instead of a fountain of youth, though, the pair seeks to understand causes of differences in longevity by studying the simple invertebrate Hydra, a freshwater genus of the phylum Cnidaria and cousin to the better known jellyfish.

Some species of Hydra do not show declining health as they get older, but can apparently survive indefinitely. Members of other species live only a specific amount of time after reproducing. The NIH grant will allow the team to investigate whether the difference in life spans among Hydra species is caused by differences in amounts of heat shock proteins (HSP), which are proteins whose expression is increased when cells are exposed to elevated temperatures or other stresses.

HSPs-which are found in virtually all living organisms, from bacteria to humans-help to minimize levels of abnormally-folded proteins in cells. Aggregations of abnormally-folded proteins are associated with human diseases including Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease. Hydra have stem cells that can replenish all of the cells in their bodies, and HSPs may prevent damage to these stem cells, permitting members of some Hydra species to live a long time without any decline in health. Information about their roles in Hydra may provide insight into how HSPs protect human cells as we age and the limitations on their ability to do so.

Bridge is an associate professor of biology at Elizabethtown College. She earned bachelor's and doctoral degrees in biology from Yale University. Prior to joining the faculty at Elizabethtown, Bridge was a postdoctoral fellow at the American Museum of Natural History and at the University of California at Irvine. She has been publishing her research on the invertebrate phylum Cnidaria -- which includes corals, sea anemones, jellyfish, and the Hydra -- for almost two decades. Many of the genetic pathways important in development of mice and humans also are involved in Cnidarian development.

Elizabethtown College, in southeastern Pennsylvania, is a private coeducational college with degrees in liberal arts, fine and performing arts, science and engineering, business, communications and education. The hallmarks of an Elizabethtown education are academic rigor, high expectations and intellectual curiosity. Our faculty members are teacher-scholars, pursuing their academic areas of expertise while sharing that expertise with students. More information is available at www.etown.edu.

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