Martin Feelisch, PhD
Department of Experimental Medicine and Integrative Biology
The University of Warwick
Coventry, United Kingdom
Organizing Committee
Session Chair
Mechanisms of Nitrite Bioactivation
Presentation Title
What Triggers the Bioactivation of Nitrite in Tissues and Where
Does it Get Reduced to NO?
After his undergraduate studies in pharmacy, Dr Feelisch earned a PhD summa cum laude in pharmacology in 1988 from the Heinrich-Heine-University, in Dusseldorf, Germany. From 1988 to 1989 he did postdoctoral work on the biochemistry and pharmacology of NO, also at Heinrich Heine. In 1999, following several senior positions in the pharmaceutical industry, Dr Feelisch joined the faculty of Louisiana State University as a Professor of molecular and cellular physiology, where he co-directed the Molecular Biology and Biochemistry Core. He assumed his current professorship at Boston University in 2003. In 1992, Dr Feelisch co-founded the Nitric Oxide Society and remains its Director. He is on the editorial boards of Endothelium and Nitric Oxide-Chemistry and Biology and in 2005 was named an Associate Editor of the British Journal of Pharmacology.
Dr Feelisch's current areas of interest center on the mechanisms of global NO signaling as well as nitrosation and nitrosylation processes in the context of oxidative stress. Besides the translational work he is involved in as a collaborator his laboratory capitalizes on a systems biology approach aimed at addressing the fate and mechanism of action of NO-related metabolites in the in vivo setting. Other areas of interest include the metabolism of NO donors and nitrite as well as the chemistry of nitroxyl (HNO), a molecule that has lately attracted attention for its possibly significant role in biology and pharmacology. Closely related to NO, HNO preferentially reacts with thiols rather than radicals and appears to increase levels of calcitonin gene-related peptide and the second messenger cyclic adenosine monophosphate. Dr. Feelisch is investigating the mechanism of the vasodilator action and tissue protective effects of Angeli's salt (Na2N2O3), a compound that decomposes to produce HNO.