The Jackson Laboratory awarded $2.4M NIH grant to study craniofacial birth defects
| Date: October 6, 2009 | 
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Jackson Laboratory researchers including Professor Leah Rae Donahue, Ph.D., and Research Scientist Stephen Murray, Ph.D., are part of a new, multi-institutional National Institutes of Health initiative to understand craniofacial birth defects.
The 5-year, $2,352,385 grant to The Jackson Laboratory is one of 11 research and technology grants of the new FaceBase Consortium funded by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR). The initiative will systematically compile the biological instructions to construct the middle region of the human face and precisely define the genetics underlying its common developmental disorders, such as cleft lip and palate. The mid-face includes the nose, upper lip, and the palate, or roof of the mouth.
"Orofacial clefting is one of the most common birth defects in humans, affecting approximately one in 700 live births," says Donahue, who is director of the Genetic Resource Science at the Laboratory. "The mouse has played an instrumental role in advancing our understanding of the mechanisms that govern mid-face and palate development. Future progress, however, will require an increasingly sophisticated set of genetic models and tools."
Donahue says the overall goal of the project at The Jackson Laboratory is to facilitate orofacial clefting research by generating new mouse genetic tools, and by providing a repository of mouse strains critical for the clefting research community.
Contact(s): Joyce Peterson, 207-288-6058
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