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Associate Professor
University of Illinois at Chicago
Dr. Podlasek, PhD. is an Associate Professor in the Departments of Urology, Physiology and Bioengineering at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her research focuses on how neural innervation establishes and maintains tissue morphology, and how neural injury contributes to disease development. An ideal model we have been studying the last 20 years focuses on prostatectomy, diabetic and aging patients in which the cavernous nerve, which provides innervation to the penis, becomes injured with surgical insult (prostatectomy), or with development of peripheral neuropathy (diabetes and aging), resulting in erectile dysfunction. Erectile dysfunction affects ~ 50% of men aged 40 to 70 and has a high impact on men’s health and quality of life. Current treatments are minimally effective in prostatectomy and diabetic patients in which there is significant cavernous nerve injury. With denervation the penis undergoes irreversible remodeling, including apoptosis of critical smooth muscle and fibrosis, with increased collagen and a change in subtypes, making the corpora cavernosa unable to respond to normal neurotransmitter signals. In order to devise novel and effective erectile dysfunction therapies, damage to the cavernous nerve must be mitigated, and smooth muscle apoptosis and collagen remodeling prevented. Dr. Podlasek's research targets all three of these processes with development of novel nanoparticle based delivery of sonic hedgehog protein in vivo to accelerate cavernous nerve regeneration and maintain corpora cavernosal morphology while the nerve regenerates, in order to re-establish erectile function.
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