Kaitlyn Dennis, a British Heart Foundation DPhil student in the Heather Group, has been awarded the William C Stanley Early Investigator Award.
She will be presented with the award for her work at the 19th Annual Meeting of the Society for Heart and Vascular Metabolism, to be held in Seoul, South Korea, from 16-19 October 2022. The scientific focus of this year's meeting is "Metabolic Modulation of Diabetes and Cardiovascular Diseases: From Mechanisms to Novel Treatment".
Kaitlyn will present her work entitled "Selective palmitoylation of CD36 is associated with metabolic dysfunction in the type 2 diabetic heart", which explores the links between type 2 diabetes and abnormal fat metabolism. Using an animal model of type 2 diabetes, Kaitlyn and her team found that fat transporters are modified post translationally, termed Palmitoylation, and this modification is increased in diabetes. She says: "We believe this modification is the defining step in the development of diabetic cardiomyopathy and may present an effective therapeutic target to restore dysfunctional cardiac metabolism as observed in type 2 diabetes."
This award recognises and highlights Kaitlyn's scientific accomplishments as a promising young researcher in this field.