UH College of Pharmacy Professor and two-time alumnus Richard A. Bond, Ph.D. ('88), BS ('83), has been awarded a U.S. Patent for the use of nadolol - a beta2-adrenoreceptor inverse agonist (aka beta blocker) - in incremental doses as a treatment for asthma. The rights to Bond's patent have been assigned to Inverseon Inc., a San Francisco-based drug development company for which Bond serves as Scientific Founder. The second Phase IIa (proof-of-concept) clinical trial on INV102 - the company's oral formulation of nadolol - recently was completed, but the results have not yet been published.

UHCOP Professor Rajender R. Aparasu, Ph.D., M.Pharm., has received a one-year, $98,000 grant from the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality (AHRQ) to evaluate the use of atypical antipsychotic agents in the elderly. Due to age-related changes in drug disposition and response, elderly patients - who are prescribed atypical antipsychotics for such conditions as psychosis, aggression and agitation - are more susceptible to antipsychotic side effects. Aparasu's project aims to determine the cumulative healthcare impact of atypical agents due to their safety and efficacy profile to ultimately optimize use and expenditures in elderly patients.

Rustin Crutchley, Pharm.D., AAHIVE, clinical assistant professor, recently became the first pharmacist to be accepted into the one-year STAR (Steps Toward Academic Research) Fellowship Program at the National Institutes of Health-supported Texas Center for Health Disparities, which is based at the University of North Texas Health Science Center in Fort Worth. Now in its fourth year, the STAR Fellowship Program provides faculty development and education for up to 10 junior faculty members from across the U.S. who are interested in health disparities research initiatives.

UH pharmacology student Odelia N. Bongmba was among only 22 graduate students and post-doctoral fellows nationwide selected to participate in the 2009 Biotechnology Minority Fellows Program sponsored by The Biotechnology Institute. Held in Atlanta, Ga., the competitive program offered networking, training and mentoring opportunities with researchers and leaders in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries, academia and the government sector as well as attendance to the BIO 2009 conference. Bongmba's research focus is on the role of the signaling protein Rac in synaptic plasticity, learning and memory, under the supervision of Assistant Professor Maria V. Tejada-Simon, Ph.D., M.Ed. ('07).

The Texas Pharmacy Foundation will award scholarships to two UH students at the TPA Rxperts Conference & Expo 2009 in San Antonio on July 25. Allison Palmer will receive the Larry "Neal" McClaugherty Scholarship and Kristen Beard will be presented with a TPF Scholarship.