Donovan Argueta
University of California-Irvine, CA·Neuroscience·Early-career
Sickle cell disease (SCD), the most common inherited blood disorder, causes pain that can begin in infancy and last a lifetime. In the United States it mainly affects people of African and Latin American descent.
- Fields
Neuroscience
Pharmacology
Medicine & Clinical Research
- Topics
sickle cell disease
chronic pain
hyperalgesia
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2029
What they work on
- Use PET neuroimaging and spatial transcriptomics to test whether a nutrient- and omega-3-enriched sickle diet changes anandamide (a natural cannabinoid) and dopamine activity in the brain and reduces pain sensitivity in sickle mice.
- Map how cell types in the descending inhibitory pain pathway, the brain-to-spinal-cord circuit that dampens pain, change with nutritional enrichment in sickle mice.
- Determine whether dietary enrichment of sickle mice alters pain-pathway function and gene expression in their offspring, using a dedicated mouse breeding colony.
- Test whether cannabinoid exposure around the time of birth causes harmful developmental effects in sickle cell disease offspring mice.
More about the research
High-dose opioids are the current treatment. Pain depends not only on nerve signals but also on mood and life circumstances, including stigma, limited resources, poor nutrition and isolation. These factors may weaken the brain's descending inhibitory pain pathway (DIPP), a circuit that sends signals down to the spinal cord to dampen incoming pain. The team reports finding that a "sickle diet" rich in nutrients and omega-3 fatty acids reduces long-lasting pain sensitivity and strengthens this pain-blocking pathway.
Why it matters
People with sickle cell disease often live with lifelong pain that is now treated mainly with high-dose opioids, and many face malnutrition and limited resources. Showing in mice that an enriched diet can reduce pain could support future clinical studies of low-cost, accessible diet-based approaches. Results on cannabinoid exposure around birth could also inform pregnancy-related guidance for families affected by the disease.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Enrico Novelli
University of Pittsburgh, PA·Medicine & Clinical Research
Determine whether hemin, a toxic breakdown product of hemoglobin, and hypoxia (low oxygen) trigger VLA-4-driven blood-cell stickiness in sickle cell mice, measured by PET imaging with the tracer 64Cu-LLP2A.
Charity Oyedeji
Duke University, NC·Medicine & Clinical Research·Early-career
Evaluate the validity and reliability of the Sickle Cell Disease Functional Assessment (SCD-FA) in a prospective cohort of adults with sickle cell disease.
Kenneth Ataga
University of Tennessee Health Science Center, TN·Medicine & Clinical Research
Build a machine learning model that predicts chronic kidney disease progression in adults with sickle cell disease, using data from a prospective, multicenter study.
The school
University of California-Irvine: 46 labs on PI Pages, $645M a year on research, 524 research doctorates a year.
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