Students from San Diego State University working at the Rees-Stealy Research Foundation under the supervision of Drs. Krown, Béjar, Dahms, and Paolini participated this year in several training programs. Results of their research projects were also presented in a number of scientific meetings.

Last year two poster presentations, one by Peter Ho and a second by Howard Reuben and Jacquié Allen, under the direction of Drs. Paolini and Béjar, were presented at the 8th Annual CSU Biotechnology Symposium held in Pomona, CA. Two abstracts were also presented at the April 1996 meeting of the American Societies of Experimental Biology held in Washington, D.C. Howard Reuben and Jacquié Allen presented a paper related to the effects of serotonin on the heart and cultured adult heart cells. A second paper was related to the cardiac responses to the hormone insulin, and involves the work carried out by undergraduate students Marcia Godínez and Liz Carzoli.

Under the auspices of the Fogarty Minority International Research Training Program, three students from the laboratory were funded to do research abroad. Dr. Robert Pozos, Assistant Dean of the College of Sciences at SDSU is the project director of this program. Dr. Ezra Béjar was mentor of three students: Angie Collymore, Liz Carzoli and Marcia Godínez. They worked in the Lab of Dr. Augustin Guerrero, Department of Biochemistry, Center for Research and Advanced Studies, IPN, Mexico City from May 29 through July 31, 1996. Dr. Steve Dahms served as mentor for Carlo Quinonez with Dr. George Dreyfuss at the Center of Cell Physiology, UNAM, Mexico City, from June through August 1996. The projects carried out at the Centro de Investigacion y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politecnico Nacional (CINVESTAV) and directed by Dr. Guerrero were:

"K-ATP Channel Modulator Effects on Intracellular Calcium Transients Elicited by Histamine on Smooth Muscle Cells" by Angie Collymore and Liz Carzoli, and "Ionomyocin Effects on the Calcium Transients of Guinea Pig

Urinary Bladder Smooth Muscle Cells" by Marcia V. Godinez and Mavil Lopez-Casamichana. Results of these projects were presented at the 1996 National Minority Research Symposium under the auspices of the National Institutes of Health, November 13-17, 1996 in Miami, Florida. This research was also supported by grants to the RSRF Laboratory by the Rees-Stealy Research Foundation, the Sharp Healthcare Foundation, and the California Metabolic Research Foundation.