Federal Project Grant Award Summary

The University of Pittsburgh received a $1,559,091 Project Grant from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) under the Cardiovascular Diseases Research program (CFDA 93.837), awarded July 10, 2026, with completion targeted for April 30, 2028. This award supports the development and validation of a novel positron emission tomography (PET) imaging approach targeting chemokine-like receptor 1 (CMKLR1) to noninvasively monitor macrophage-driven inflammation in post-myocardial infarction (MI) cardiac remodeling. The research deliverables include: (1) preclinical validation of CMKLR1-targeted PET imaging as a tool for tracking chronic myocardial inflammation and predicting post-MI heart failure risk in murine models; (2) assessment of imaging biomarker responsiveness to immunomodulatory therapies; and (3) translational analysis of publicly available transcriptomic datasets from patients with ischemic cardiomyopathy to establish clinical relevance of CMKLR1 and RARRES2 (fibroblast-derived ligand) expression as indicators of active inflammation and extracellular matrix remodeling.

This research addresses a critical gap in cardiovascular medicine by providing physicians with a noninvasive diagnostic tool to identify patients with sustained myocardial inflammation who may benefit from emerging immunomodulatory therapies and to monitor treatment efficacy—capabilities lacking in current clinical practice despite strong preclinical evidence supporting macrophage-fibroblast crosstalk as a driver of post-MI heart failure pathogenesis.