Biography
Dr. Gary Gilbert, M.D. is the Deputy Associate Chief of Staff for Research and Development at the VA Boston Healthcare System. In his capacity, he oversees the basic science activities at all three campuses and has charge of major initiatives to import new technical capabilities and build a major expansion of the animal facilities He also serves as a member of BVARI’s Board of Directors. Dr. Gilbert is Associate Physician in Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard medical School.
His research interests target understanding the mechanisms through which activity of blood coagulation proteins is regulated on cell membranes. He has four categories of research in his laboratory:
1. To study the characterization of the mechanism through which lactadherin binds to membranes and functions as an anticoagulant in vitro. This includes structure-function studies to identify essential features of the interaction.
2. To utilize lactadherin and probes derived from lactadherin to identify procoagulant membranes in vivo and to probe the importance.
3. To identify the functional amino acids on the membrane-interactive C1 and C2 domains of factor VIII. This project may lead to engineering factor VIII so that the product molecule has higher specific activity and a slower rate of clearance.
4. To seek to determine through what mechanisms phospholipid molecules activate the factor VIIIa-factor IXa enzyme complex. This information will provide improved basic insight and, possibly, a novel approach to treatment of hemophilia patients that have developed inhibitory antibodies to factor VIII.