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Profile - Brandon Kayser
Brandon Kayser
Contact Information
E-mail: bkayser@usc.edu
Phone: (310) 480-5253
Mail Code: 0371
Started at USC: Fall 2008
Education:
2008 – present
Graduate Student, Integrative & Evolutionary Biology
University of Southern California, Los Angeles
2003 ��� 2007
B.S. Athletic Training, Magna Cum Laude
BOC Certified Athletic Trainer
Chapman University, Orange
Faculty Advisor(s):
Dr. Casey Donovan, Kinesiology
Collaboration(s):
Dr. Alan Watts, Neurobiology
Research Abstract:
The primary research focus of our lab is to functionally asses the physiology of glucose sensors located in the portal-mesenteric vein with regard to hypoglycemic counter-regulation.�� Our lab has thus far demonstrated that these sensors respond to slowly induced hypoglycemia, as opposed to rapid hypoglycemia, and that this signal is propagated to the central nervous system by spinal afferent neurons to evoke a counter-regulatory response.�� This is notable because portal-mesenteric glucose sensing has previously been attributed solely to co-located vagal afferent neurons.�� Using a novel anesthetized model, my goal is to characterize these glucose sensors using metabolic or receptor-ligand models (similar to taste-buds) while concurrently delineating the afferent neural pathway from the receptors to the synapses with the spinal cord.�� Thus, my findings will help to clarify the physiological interplay between vagal and spinal afferent glucose sensing.�� The integration of neurological histochemical analysis and sophisticated neural tracer techniques, advanced by collaboration with Dr. Alan Watt’s lab, will contribute significantly to our well established in vivo experimentation.�� Additionally, this may provide insight into a fundamental question in the evolution of hypoglycemic detection - if the physiological occurrence of hypoglycemia is primarily caused by the relatively recent advent of aggressive insulin therapy, what prolonged evolutionary stimuli have favored the persistence of this vagal and spinal afferent signaling pathway?
Recent Publications:
Kayser BD, Godfrey JK, Cunningham RM, Pierce RA, Jaque SV, Sumida KD. Equivalent increases
in BMD from daily vs. triweekly training. (Submitted for publication)
Godfrey JK, Kayser BD, Gomez GV, Bennett J, Jaque SV, Sumida KD. Interrupted resistance
training and BMD in growing rats. Int J Sports Med (in press - Thieme)
CV: Click to view