Congratulations to Principal Investigator Luke Lamers, MD, associate professor, Cardiology, and Co-Principal Investigator Colleen Witzenburg, PhD, assistant professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering, who were recently awarded a $50,000 Translational Basic and Clinical Pilot Program grant from the University of Wisconsin’s Institute for Clinical and Translational Research (ICTR). Their project, “Comprehensive assessment of aortic coarctation and its treatment,” will use an animal model to define the cardiovascular changes that occur over time in untreated post-surgical coarctation of the aorta (COA), and then determine the outcomes of early COA stent intervention using a novel growth stent. They hypothesize that the cardiovascular changes that occur in untreated post-surgical COA will be significantly reduced with early effective COA stent intervention. Their one-year project hopes to minimize signs of early vascular aging seen in untreated COA.