Science News from BCVS 2023

Welcome to the best science from #BCVS23

This is where you'll find exclusive interviews with scientific presenters and AHA volunteers about the most impactful or noteworthy science delivered during BCVS 2023 in Boston, Massachusetts.

Welcome to #BCVS23

Program Chair Sumanth Prabhu, MD, American Heart Association President Joe Wu, MD, PhD, and Jianyi Zhang, MD, PhD welcome attendees to BCVS 2023, preview upcoming highlights, and talk a bit about what the meeting has meant to them.

This Year's Program Highlights

BCVS Program Chair Sumanth Prabhu, MD and Vice Chair, Farah Sheikh, PhD preview some of the highlights they have planned for this year's meeting and the areas of cardiovascular research that will be covered.

Early Career Keynote Address

BCVS Early Career Committee Chair Susmita Sahoo, PhD interviews this year's keynote speaker Maria Kontaridis, PhD about her address, "Developing Your Career and Leading with Conviction" and her advice for early career cardiovascular scientists.

Keynote Lecturer: Eric Olson, PhD

Program Chair Sumanth Prabhu, MD and Vice Chair Farah Sheikh, PhD interview Eric Olson, PhD about his keynote lecture, "Thinking Big and Thinking Small about the Heart" and about distinguished career in molecular biology.

The Future of Genetic Medicine

Moderator Paola Rosas, PhD interviews Elizabeth McNally, MD, PhD about her presentation on the use of genetic testing not only to diagnose cardiomyopathy and to understand the genetic causes of the disease but also to help identify patients at risk for particular conditions and identifying the proper drug therapies for them based on their specific genetic profiles.

Developing New Organoid and Endothelial Cell Models

Moderator Nenad Bursac, PhD interviews Minxia Gu, Md, PhD about her work deriving organoids and endothelial cell models from human iPSCs for the study of congenital heart disease.

Myosin Binding Protein C Therapeutics

Moderator Paola Rosas, PhD interviews Julian Stelzer, PhD about his work looking at different proteins that regulate myosin in hopes of better understanding the underlying mechanisms that contribute to heart failure.

Cardio-immunology and Heart Disease

Annet Kirabo, PhD, moderator of session 9 on cardio-immunology and heart disease interviews Pilar Alcaide, PhD who spoke about her work on the role of T cell immune responses in heart remodelling and Susan Sattler, MSc, PhD who spoke on the role dendritic cells in cardiac injury.

Sex-biased Mechanisms of Stress-induced Cardiac Remodelling

Moderator Susan E. Howlett, PhD, Dalhousie University interviews George Kararigas, PhD about his presentation on "Sex-biased Mechanisms of Stress-induced Cardiac Remodelling."

Sex Differences in the Role of the Mineralocorticoid Receptors in Atherosclerosis

Susan E. Howlett, PhD, one of the moderators of Session 11 on Taking Sex Differences to Heart—From Basic to Clinical interviews Iris Jaffe, MD, PhD who spoke about sex differences in the role of mineralocorticoidreceptors in atherosclerosis.

Arrhythmogenic Basis for Cardiac Disease

Moderator Irene Turnbull, PhD, Mount Sinai interviews two speakers from session 9 on arrhythmogenic cardiac disease, Sean Wu, MD, PhD , who spoke about his work on "Comprehensive Mapping of Cardiac Enhancers in the Developing Heart" and Francisco Alvarado, PhD, who presented on "RyR2 Dysfunction in Cardiomyopathy."

Clonal Tracking Using Lentiviral Barcoding and High Throughput Sequencing

Moderator Chunhui Xu, PhD interviews Rong Lu, PhD about her work using lentiviral barcoding and high throughput sequencing to track how hematopoietic stem cells differ from one another in blood production and how they work together to regenerate a balanced blood supply.

Outstanding Early Career Investigator Competition

Moderators Aikaterini Kontrogianni-Konstantopoulos, PhD and Nicole Purcell, PhD introduce Haobo Li, PhD,  Qiongxin Wang, PhD,  and Asma Boukhalfa, PhD,  finalists for the BCVS 2023 Outstanding Early Career Award Competition who briefly describe the research they submitted. The winner this year was Haboa Li, PhD from Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School for his work, "Cardiomyocyte DCHS2 Inhibition Protects Against Heart Failure."

Metabolic Alterations in Heart Disease

Moderator Anja Karlstaedt, MD, PhD interviews two speakers from Session 13, Robert Weiss, MD, who spoke about his work investigating how impaired energy metabolism contributes to arrhythmias, and graduate student Omar Brito-Estada, who presented his work looking at Dworf overexpression in the heart and mitochondrial function.