Department of Anesthesia at UF

Christoph Seubert, MD

After completing a two-year fellowship in cardiac research funded by the American Heart Association, my research program has evolved to encompass three major areas: 1) clinically oriented anesthesia research, 2) neuronal effects of aromatic amino acids, and 3) drug design and development of novel drugs, including nanotechnology applications in medicine.

Clinically oriented anesthesia research. My major clinical research project addresses a question vital to the medical care of astronauts, namely how adaptation to weightlessness changes the response to general anesthesia. For this NASA-funded endeavor, I have assembled an intercollegiate research team from the Department of Anesthesiology, the College of Pharmacy, and the College of Allied Health Professions to study the changes in pharmacokinetics, drug effect, and recovery from anesthesia in a randomized cross-over study of volunteers exposed to an earth-based simulation of weightlessness. A recent new clinical research direction is the study of effects of anesthesia on long-term mortality in a cohort of women undergoing surgery for gynecologic tumors.

Neuronal effects of aromatic amino acids. Although phenylketonuria is the most frequent biochemical cause of mental retardation and is a well-researched prototypical genetic disease, the pathogenesis of its neurological symptoms is poorly understood. In close collaboration with Dr. Martynyuk, we have described the neuronal effects of L-phenylalanine, the pathogenetic agent of phenylketonuria. These studies span cellular electrophysiology in neuronal cultures and brain slices, receptor pharmacology, mass spectrometry, molecular biology, and whole animal studies in the genetic mouse model of phenylketonuria. Because of robust results across various experimental settings, we plan to take these studies from bench to bedside in the form of a pilot study in phenylketonuria patients, which is already approved and supported by the NIH-funded General Clinical Research Center. Further directions of this research effort have focused on neuroprotective, neuro-modulatory and anti-epileptic effects of aromatic amino acids.

Department Patents

GAARRC

Faculty Research

Nikolaus Gravenstein, MD
Department Chair

Michael J Banner PhD
Jerry Berger, MD
Larry Berman, MD
Azra Bihorac, MD
David Bjoraker, MD
Don Caton, MD
Laurie K Davies, MD
Donn Dennis, MD
F Kayser Enneking, MD
Tammy Euliano, MD
Andrea Gabrielli, MD
Dietrich Gravenstein, MD
Joachim S Gravenstein, MD
Gregory M Jenelle, MD
Sem Lampotang, PhD
A Joseph Layon, MD
Emilio Lobato, MD
Michael E Mahla, MD
Anatoly Martynyuk, MD
Richard J Melker, MD
Jerome Modell, MD
Tim Morey, MD
David A Paulus, MD
Yong Gang Peng, MD
Raymond Schultetus, MD
Christoph Seubert, MD
Avner Sidi, MD
Cheri Sulek, MD
Hans van Oostrom, PhD