Frances Plane
Dr Frances Plane 
Associate Professor
Education:
PhD Pharmacology, University of London, London, U.K., 1992
Office: 9-62A Medical Sciences Bldg
Lab: 9-62 Medical Sciences Bldg
fplane@ualberta.ca
Teaching: PMCOL425
Awards:
Research: Endothelial ion channels as drug targets for the treatment of cardiovascular disease
Cardiovascular Research Institute
Research Interests / Laboratory Techniques
The goal of our research is to understand how blood vessels function under normal and disease conditions with the aim of developing strategies to overcome the vascular dysfunction that contributes to clinical outcomes in pathological states such as diabetes.
The diameter of small blood vessels, resistance arteries, is the main factor determining arterial blood pressure, local blood flow and tissue perfusion, and so must be tightly controlled. The two main cell types that make up blood vessels are the endothelial cells lining the lumen and the smooth muscle cells which make up the vessel wall. Communication between these two cell types is crucial for the appropriate regulation of resistance artery diameter: endothelial cells regulate the contractile state of the surrounding smooth muscle cells via the release of diffusible factors, such as nitric oxide, and by direct electrical coupling with smooth muscle cells via myoendothelial gap junctions. Disruption of endothelial-smooth muscle cell communication is a hallmark of cardiovascular disease contributing to clinical manifestations such as high blood pressure, atherosclerosis, thrombosis and loss of limbs. Indeed, impairment of endothelium-dependent vasodilation can be used to identify individuals at increased risk for future cardiovascular events providing a "barometer" for vascular health.
We are currently using a combination of functional, electrophysiological and molecular techniques to further elucidate how endothelial and smooth muscle cells interact to regulate resistance artery diameter and to identify novel therapeutic targets to restore endothelial function in disease. Our current focus is on endothelial dysfunction associated with metabolic diseases.
Selected Recent Publications
1. Back V, Asgari A, Franczak A, Saito M, Castaneda Zaragoza D, Sandow SL, Plane F, Jurasz P. Inhibition of platelet aggregation by activation of platelet intermediate conductance Ca2+ -activated potassium channels. J Thromb Haemost. 2022 Nov;20(11):2587-2600. doi: 10.1111/jth.15827. Epub 2022 Aug 7. PMID: 35867883