Professor commended for asthma research

UH Associate Professor of Pharmacology Richard Bond, was formaly honored for his asthma research at 2011 Medical Futures Innovation Awards ceremony in London.

Bond’s proposal has to do with beta blocker drugs, which will be used to aid those with asthma and other various airway diseases. Bond’s company, Bond and Inverseon, was commended by the MFIA and currently houses a patent for the inverse agonist beta blocker called nadolol.

“Innovation is the lifeblood for any organization, especially in current frugal times of economic uncertainty,” said orthopedic surgeon Dr. Andy Goldberg, founder and chairman of the MFIA. “The Medical Futures judges were blown away by the sheer volume and quality of brilliant ideas that have the potential to change people’s lives. The judges were encouraged by Dr. Bond’s ‘out-of-the-box’ thinking on using beta blockers in (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), an area of huge unmet need and, historically, where such drugs have deliberately been avoided.”

The MFIA is a non-profit organization that encourages those in the field of science to put forward new innovations. Hundreds of proposals are sent to the MFIA, but only a fraction of these initiatives are accepted. When the official proposals are chosen, they must go through a full panel of judges and the highest scoring proposals are given the honors. This year, 12 proposals were chosen by the MFIA, but just four were actually honored, Bond’s being one of them.

According to a press release written by UH Senior Science Writer and Media Relation Representative Lisa Merkl, Professor Bond and his colleagues from UH, the M.D. Cancer Center, and the Baylor College of Medicine have been working with compounds called inverse agonist beta blockers for the last ten years to develop a medication to treat both mild and severe asthma. The conclusion of their investigation shows that while beta blockers at first spark a negative side effect in the airway, the side effect is actually overturned with prolonged use of the medication. In fact, this new medication may improve the lives of people who have asthma, bronchitis, and even COPD. Bond advises one dose of the medicine per day can either stop or put a limit on acute asthma attacks.

“I’m truly honored that our work is being recognized by the same organization that presented my mentor and friend, Sir James Black, with a Lifetime Achievement Award,” Bond said. Sir James Black is known for being the Father of Beta Blockers. Bond was also the only scientist from the United States to be honored by the MFIA’s 2011 conference.

Though Bond’s company is stationed in San Francisco, UH would receive royalties from the beta blocker medication’s sales.