Seham Ebrahim, PhD
Seham Ebrahim, PhD, an assistant professor in the Department of Molecular Physiology and Biological Physics, was awarded a prestigious Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award (MIRA) R35 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for $2 million to investigate mechanosensing mechanisms at the intestinal surface. MIRA supports research in an investigator’s laboratory that falls within the mission of the National Institute of General Medical Sciences.
Intestines are constantly exposed to physical forces—from the stretch of food moving through the gut to the pressure of fluid flow and microbial activity. Yet scientists still don’t fully understand how the cells lining the intestine sense and respond to these mechanical cues. With support from the NIH-R35 award, the Ebrahim Lab is investigating the fundamental mechanisms by which intestinal epithelial cells detect mechanical forces and convert them into biological signals—a process known as mechanotransduction.
This work has broad implications for understanding how the gut maintains its barrier function, regulates inflammation, and adapts to injury. Defects in mechanotransduction may contribute to diseases like inflammatory bowel disease, or IBD, colorectal cancer, and even systemic infections. By uncovering how these mechanisms work at the molecular level, Dr. Ebrahim and her team hope to identify new targets for therapies that could strengthen gut health and prevent disease.
Filed Under: Research