Mariana Kaplan Receives American College of Rheumatology Henry Kunkel Young Investigator Award
ATLANTA - Mariana J. Kaplan, MD; associate professor of internal medicine at the division of rheumatology at the University of Michigan Medical School, received the Henry Kunkel Young Investigator Award From the American College of Rheumatology during the ACR Annual Scientific Meeting, November 6 - 11 in Atlanta.
The Henry Kunkel Young Investigator Award is given to a young Physician scientist, age 45 or under, who has made outstanding independent contributions to basic or clinical research in the field of rheumatology.
Dr. Kaplan was born in Chile and grew up in Argentina and Mexico. She graduated Summa Cum Laude from the Medical School at the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City and completed her residency in internal medicine at the Mexican National Institutes of Health. During her rheumatology fellowship at the University of Michigan, she worked in the laboratory of Bruce C. Richardson, MD, PhD, studying mechanisms of T cell autoreactivity and the role of antigen presenting cell death in lupus pathogenesis. Dr. Kaplan became assistant professor at the division of rheumatology at the University of Michigan in 2001 and was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 2008. She is also a member of the graduate program in immunology at the same institution.
Dr. Kaplan’s research has focused on identifying mechanisms of organ damage in systemic autoimmunity. She has established a new paradigm for the pathogenesis and potential treatment of accelerated atherosclerosis that complicates autoimmune diseases. She has demonstrated accelerated endothelial cell apoptosis and deficient repair by endothelial progenitor cells in lupus, with a critical role for type I interferons.
Dr. Kaplan has also recently identified novel pathways by which type I IFNs may induce vasculopathy. Her work has also focused on identifying abnormalities of myeloid cell function (neutrophils and dendritic cells) in lupus that may contribute to both the development of autoimmune responses and to end-organ damage in this disease. She recently identified a subset of pathogenic lupus low density granulocytes that induce vascular damage and interfere with vascular repair. Dr. Kaplan also has an interest in identifying novel therapeutic targets to prevent premature vascular damage in systemic autoimmunity and is the PI on an ongoing trial attempting to reduce vascular risk in RA. Besides her research activities, she is an active clinician and teacher at the University of Michigan and a member of the Multidisciplinary Lupus Clinic at this institution.
Dr. Kaplan has been very active in the ACR. She was member of the Committee on Research serving as liaison to the Committee on Government Affairs. She currently chairs the Committee on Research subcommittee and helps maintain the partnership between the ACR and the National Institutes of Health. She is a member of the Scientific Advisory Council and has served on a variety of editorial boards. Dr. Kaplan is currently the section editor of the Journal of Immunology and advisory editor For Arthritis & Rheumatism. She is also active with other organizations and serves on the Scientific Advisory Council of the Lupus Foundation of America. Dr. Kaplan has received various awards throughout her career including the ACR Senior Rheumatology Scholar Award, the Jerome Conn Award for Excellence in Research at the University of Michigan and she was elected to the American Society for Clinical Investigation.
The American College of Rheumatology is an international professional medical society that represents more than 8,000 rheumatologists and rheumatology health professionals around the world. Its mission is to advance rheumatology. The ACR/ARHP Annual Scientific Meeting is the premier meeting in rheumatology. For more information about the meeting, visit www.rheumatology.org/education. Follow the meeting on twitter by using the official hashtag: #ACR2010.
