Research Rising
Record-breaking research growth has propelled the college into the Top 5 of the national rankings.

n research labs and faculty offices across the University of Florida College of Pharmacy, scientists are leading new discoveries that span the entire life cycle of a drug. Their efforts are significantly impacting the lives of patients around the world and elevating UF to an elite research status among pharmacy colleges in the nation.
The American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy, or AACP, released its annual research report May 8, and the UF College of Pharmacy made substantial moves up the national rankings for total grant funding and NIH funding. The college placed No. 4 nationally in both total funding ($23.7 million) and NIH funding ($16.5 million). In a third category measured by AACP, the college ranked No. 5 nationally in total federal funding ($19.3 million).
“UF has always been recognized for having one of the nation’s top pharmacy research programs, and the 2018 rankings affirm we belong among the elite pharmacy colleges in the nation,” said Julie Johnson, Pharm.D., dean and distinguished professor in the UF College of Pharmacy. “Being ranked No. 4 for total and NIH funding is a testament to our amazing faculty and their research teams who are dedicated to solving some of the world’s biggest health challenges through scientific discoveries.”
All medicinal chemistry and pharmacodynamics tenure-track Ph.D. program faculty are federally funded

The departments of medicinal chemistry and pharmacodynamics achieved a rare feat this year — all 20 of the of the tenure-track Ph.D. program faculty earned federal grant funding as a principal investigator. The 10 medicinal chemistry faculty served as principal investigators on 18 different federally funded grants worth more than $18.4 million. Meanwhile, the 10 faculty in the department of pharmacodynamics earned 25 federally funded grants worth nearly $27 million.
“Having all of our tenure-track faculty federally funded is an amazing accomplishment,” said Hendrik Luesch, Ph.D., a professor and chair of medicinal chemistry and the Debbie and Sylvia DeSantis Chair in Natural Products Drug Discovery and Development. “In an era when competition for federal grants is extremely competitive, our faculty have demonstrated success in promoting research ideas and projects that have immense potential to improve human health.”
The 10 medicinal chemistry tenure-track faculty are leading research projects spanning broad interest areas, from identifying novel cancer drugs in the ocean to developing new compounds as potential therapies to combat drug abuse. In the department of pharmacodynamics, the tenure-track faculty are engaged in multiple research projects that aim to better understand how drugs act, and the human biological processes upon which they act.
“To have all department faculty federally funded is a superlative achievement reserved for only a few departments in any of the biomedical sciences, whether it be pharmacy, medicine, dentistry or allied health,” said Lance McMahon, Ph.D., a professor and chair of the department of pharmacodynamics. “This perfection is made even more incredible by the fact our colleagues in the department of medicinal chemistry have achieved the same perfect status.”

UF awarded grant to establish a cancer health equity center

The National Cancer Institute has awarded a five-year, $16 million grant to establish a cancer health equity center at the University of Florida and partner institutions. The Florida-California Cancer Research, Education and Engagement, or CaRE2, Health Equity Center will be an interdisciplinary, intercollegiate effort involving researchers from UF, Florida A&M University and the University of Southern California.
The center will bring together researchers from the two states with the highest cancer incidence and mortality to create a bicoastal minority cancer research and training center. Florida and California also have uniquely rich and heterogeneous populations of Blacks and Latinos, who are the focus of this study.
Led at UF by program directors Folakemi Odedina, Ph.D., and Diana Wilkie, Ph.D., the CaRE2 center is directed and administered by multiple principal investigators from each institution. Odedina serves a dual appointment as a professor in the colleges of Pharmacy and Medicine, part of UF Health. Wilkie is the Prairieview Trust-Earl and Margo Powers Endowed Professor in the College of Nursing and director of the Center for Palliative Care Research and Education. Both Odedina and Wilkie have extensive experience in leading multidisciplinary center grants and cancer disparities research.
“Behind every cancer statistic are the tears and agonies of cancer patients, survivors, family members and friends,” Odedina said. “I take the fight against cancer personally, because I am simply tired of seeing unnecessary cancer deaths in minority and underserved populations globally.”
Within each institution there are six CaRE2 center cores designed to be highly integrated into the research platform and to support the overall mission. These cores are led by researchers at multiple campuses, including the colleges of Medicine, Pharmacy, Nursing and Education, the UF Research and Academic Center at Lake Nona, and UF Health Jacksonville, as well as UF Health Shands Hospital. The team includes researchers with expertise across the spectrum, from molecular biology and bioinformatics to community outreach and clinical interventions.
For the first phase of the center, two full research projects and one pilot project will be conducted that are focused on prostate and pancreatic cancers, two cancers with noted disparities among Blacks and little-known information among Latinos.
The first full research project will aim to understand the contribution of novel mitochondrial-derived peptides to racial differences in prostate cancer development. The second research aims to reduce disparities in efficacy of a chemotherapy treatment by using molecular profiles of patients to predict their sensitivity to this treatment, taking into account various factors related to racial and ethnic differences.
Thomas Schmittgen, Ph.D., a professor and chair of the UF College of Pharmacy’s department of pharmaceutics, will lead the pilot project that focuses on identifying the genetic basis of racial disparities in pancreatic cancer by examining early events that lead to the cancer formation, using human samples in vitro. Another goal of the center is to provide research training opportunities for underrepresented minority trainees and early-stage investigators that fosters their individual career development.
NIDA awards two multimillion-dollar grants to bolster kratom research

The National Institute on Drug Abuse has awarded the University of Florida College of Pharmacy two multimillion-dollar grants to study kratom. The first — a two-year, $3.5 million grant — examines kratom’s alkaloids individually. The second — a five-year, $3.4 million grant — evaluates these alkaloids together to study kratom’s effect as a whole.
Principal investigators on the studies include Chris McCurdy, Ph.D., a professor of medicinal chemistry; Lance McMahon, Ph.D., a professor and chair of the department of pharmacodynamics; and the late Bonnie Avery, Ph.D., a clinical professor of pharmaceutics. Avery passed away in March, just one month before the second NIDA grant was funded.
Researchers in the college have studied kratom, or Mitragyna speciosa, as a potential therapy to wean addicts off heroin or prescription opioids. The plant, which comes from the leaves of a tropical tree from Southeast Asia, has appeared on U.S. regulators’ radar in recent years due to its correlation with abuse in the western world, although Southeast Asians have used kratom for hundreds of years seemingly unharmed.
With the first grant, UF researchers will seek to identify the pharmacology of kratom’s 40 alkaloids, test the effects of these individual alkaloids on the brain’s receptors and continue to develop treatment strategies to help addicts quit opioids. The second NIDA grant funds the study of the plant’s effect as a whole, essentially what people consume as kratom.
UF investigators will be able to compare the effects of kratom in its traditional form — as a tea made from fresh leaves — versus the way westerners consume it — as dried leaves. The team hypothesizes the harm associated with kratom has to do with users commingling it with other drugs, and that dried leaves tend to have higher concentrations of active alkaloidal compounds.
“We want to find out why we are seeing more harm in the western world when we don’t see it in Southeast Asia,” McCurdy said.
Most researchers only analyze kratom for mitragynine, its most abundant alkaloid, even though it contains more than 40. Avery’s expertise led to the developing of the methodology to simultaneously identify and quantify 10 alkaloids.