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Mission
The Lovelace Respiratory Research Institute CounterACT Research Center of Excellence (Lovelace-CRCE) will focus on injury caused by the chemical agent, sulfur mustard (SM). SM is recognized as a likely chemical threat agent that could be used by terrorists in a civilian setting. Exposure to SM may go unnoticed because it is not an irritant and has a garlic or mustard-like odor and because symptoms of exposure do not develop for 4–48 hours after initial exposure, complicating the identification of victims and the determination of the severity of their exposure.
In response to this challenge, the Lovelace-CRCE is developing a comprehensive program that will target the development of countermeasures to diagnose and treat SM injury in the three most affected organs: the lungs, the skin, and the eyes. Our comprehensive program is composed of five research projects, three scientific cores (exposure, chemistry, and pathology), and administrative and educational and training cores.
Project 1 will focus on the identification of diagnostic markers and the development of reliable, simple tests for these markers that can be used by first responders and others to assist in the identification of SM-exposed individuals.
Projects 2–4 will focus on the molecular and cellular mechanisms of SM injury and pathology in the lung, eye, and skin in order to identify additional countermeasure therapeutics to be evaluated in Project 5.
Project 5 will test and improve therapeutics for all target organs.
The Education and Training Core will provide educational opportunities for LRRI and outside scientists and other interested parties and create a specimen bank of SM exposed samples.
The overall goal of the Lovelace-CRCE is the rapid identification and development of top countermeasure therapeutics than can be used for the treatment of SM-induced injury in a civilian population.
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