The collaborative project was selected from a rigorous pool of 400 letters of intent and 87 applications, with the Birmingham Veterans Affairs team being the only VA-funded awardee.Louis Dell’Italia, M.D., professor emeritus at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Marnix E. Heersink School of Medicine, collaborated with Selma Kane, Ph.D., and Betty Pat, Ph.D., at Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Birmingham, to secure a highly competitive Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs Toxic Exposures Research Award from the United States Department of Defense.
Dell’Italia, the Elmer and Glenda Harris Endowed Chair in Cardiovascular Disease and associate chief of staff for Research at Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Birmingham, says toxic exposure research is vital because it addresses unique occupational hazards that lead to life-altering health consequences for veterans.
“Military service frequently involves unavoidable, long-term exposure to complex mixtures of toxins, such as jet fuel, burn pit emissions and chemical solvents at intensities rarely seen in other professions,” Dell’Italia said. “This new grant will address this by establishing a definitive causal link between jet fuel and chronic cardiopulmonary disease.”
The collaboration between the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs will bridge the gap between service members’ lives as active-duty and as veterans, creating a comprehensive bench-to-bedside pipeline.
“Through this grant, we will be able to track health outcomes across a person’s military career and beyond, which is critical for understanding diseases that take years or even decades to manifest after an exposure,” Kane said.
The study aims to identify a unique genetic fingerprint, known as a transcriptional signature, which will serve as a reliable biological marker of exposure by using advanced techniques like machine learning and transcriptomics.
“The project will help us develop non-invasive diagnostic tools to monitor health impacts in both active-duty personnel and veterans and provide the scientific evidence necessary to streamline disability claims and ensure appropriate health care and benefits,” Dell’Italia said.
This collaboration was made possible through Veterans Institutional Support for Training and Research, VISTAR, Birmingham Veterans Affairs’ nonprofit research arm, which allowed administrative flexibility and scientific synergy.
“Using VISTAR to submit the grant, our project benefited from a flexible and efficient administrative framework designed to manage non-VA funding, such as Department of Defense or National Institutes of Health grants,” Dell’Italia said. “It will allow us to tap into restricted federal assets, like the Million Veteran Program and the Corporate Data Warehouse, along with UAB’s academic resources.”