Christian Egly, PharmD, is the Molecular Pharmacology Highlighted Trainee Author for the April 2022 issue. He earned his Doctor of Pharmacy from Purdue University’s College of Pharmacy in 2018. Dr. Egly is currently a postdoctoral trainee in the Division of Clinical Pharmacology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, under the direction of Björn C. Knollmann. The Molecular Pharmacology article that earned his selection as a Highlighted Trainee Author is titled “A High-Throughput Assay to Identify Drugs that can Treat Long QT Syndrome Caused by Trafficking-deficient KV11.1 (hERG) Variants” and is available at https://doi.org/10.1124/molpharm.121.000421.
In pharmacy school, Dr. Egly’s work focused on the KV11.1 potassium ion channel, formerly known as the human ether-a-go-go related gene (hERG). Dysfunction of this channel causes Long QT Syndrome (LQTS) and is a risk for a fatal cardiac arrhythmia: torsades de pointes. His work resulted in a better understanding of the potential impact of progesterone metabolites on KV11.1 channel electrophysiology.
Dr. Egly’s current work focuses on developing high-throughput screening techniques (thallium-flux) to screen for drugs that increase intracellular transport (trafficking) in genetic variants of KV11.1. Trafficking deficiency encompasses close to 90% of pathogenic KV11.1 variants, so identifying drugs that increase channel trafficking and restore KV11.1 function holds promise. Potential impact of his work includes the identification of clinically approved drugs to treat patients with LQTS. The HTS approach he developed has identified several promising drug candidates thus far.
Outside of the lab, Christian enjoys playing guitar at open blues jams in the Nashville area. He also enjoys playing or watching Purdue basketball.