Peter Erhardt, M.D., Ph.D.
Scientist
Signal transduction of programmed cell death in cancer cells and myocytes.
Email: erhardt at bbri.org

Research Summary
The major interest of our laboratory is to elucidate the role of the p53/MDM2 and B-Raf/Erk signaling pathways in two different modes of cell death such as necrosis and apoptosis.  We pay particular attention to the heart tissue because loss of cardiac myocytes represents the major factor in the pathogenesis of cardiac infarcts.  These studies include analysis of isolated cells as well as development of transgenic and knock out mouse models.  Our goal is to identify potential therapeutic targets and then modify them to prevent cell death by gene therapy or treat ischemic heart diseases with improved stem cells.

Selected Publications
Nickson, P., Toth, A, Erhardt, P. Puma is critical for neonatal cardiomyocyte apoptosis induced by endoplasmic reticulum stress. Cardiovascular Res., 2006, in press.

Toth, A., Jeffers, J. R., Nickson, P., Min, J. Y., Morgan, J. P., Zambetti, G. P., Erhardt, P. (2006) Targeted deletion of Puma attenuates cardiomyocyte death and improves cardiac function during ischemia-reperfusion. Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol. 291, H52-60.

Toth, A., Nickson, P., Qin, L. L., Erhardt, P. (2006)  Differential regulation of cardiomyocyte survival and hypertrophy by MDM2, an E3 ubiquitin ligase. J. Biol. Chem. 281, 3679-89.

Yoeli-Lerner, M., Yiu, G. K., Rabinovitz, I., Erhardt, P., Jauliac, S., Toker, A. (2005) Akt blocks breast cancer cell motility and invasion through the transcription factor NFAT. Mol Cell. 20, 539-50. Erratum in: Mol Cell. 2006 Apr 7;22(1):145.

Erhardt, P., Schremser, E.J. & Cooper, G.M. (1999) B-Raf inhibits programmed cell death downstream of cytochrome c release from mitochondria by activating the MEK/Erk pathway. Mol. Cell. Biol. 19, 5308-5315.

Erhardt, P., Tomaselli, K. & Cooper, G.M. (1997) Identification of the oncoprotein MDM2 as a substrate for CPP32-like apoptotic proteases. J. Biol. Chem. 272, 15049-15052.

PubMed:
Click here for a list of publications (searches the National Library of Medicine's PubMed database.)