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Randy Strong, Ph.D.

Director, NIA Aging Interventions Testing Center

Co-Director NIA Nathan Shock Center of Excellence in the Biology of Aging

Associate Director for Translational Research, Barshop Institute

Currently seeking Ph.D. students

I am a tenured Professor of Pharmacology at UT Health San Antonio Texas and a Senior Research Career Scientist in the affiliated Veterans Health Administration (VA) and an associate member of a VA Geriatric Research, Education and Clinical Center (GRECC). I direct one of 8 National Institute on Aging (NIA)-funded Nathan Shock Centers of Excellence in the Biology of Aging (P30 grant). Our center focuses on identifying therapeutic targets for test-agents that may increase longevity and extend the healthy portion of the lifespan (healthspan). I also direct one of 3 national centers, as part of the Aging Interventions Testing Program (ITP), a cooperative program funded by the National Institute on Aging through a U01 mechanism. For more than 16 years, I have collaborated closely with Drs. Richard Miller and David Harrison, directors of the Interventions Testing Centers at the University of Michigan (UM) and The Jackson Laboratory (TJL), respectively, to test, in parallel at each site, interventions that are hypothesized to increase lifespan and health and reduce diseases in genetically heterogeneous mice. The UT site contributes to the effort by providing pharmacology expertise. One of our greatest achievements is that we led the study at UT showing, for the first time, that a drug, rapamycin, increased lifespan of mice, even when treatment was begun late in life (Nature, 2009). I am Associate Director of the San Antonio Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center (P30 award). Our center is testing compounds in elderly humans and non-human primates, including those test agents identified by the ITP as extending lifespan and improving health. In addition, I am funded by the VA to determine the role of biogenic aldehydes in Parkinson’s disease. Using several different genetically altered mouse models that we produced we are investigating potential therapeutic targets, including neurotoxic metabolites of dopamine. I am also a Co-PI of the Stevens Foundation Parkinson’s Disease Center of Excellence whose purpose is to enhance education and research in Parkinson’s disease at the UT Health Science Center.