Benjamin Gaston, MD

Dr. Gaston is a physician-scientist who has been continuously funded by NIH for over 20 years. He is currently principal investigator on a Program Project Grant and several other NIH grants.  Trainees are involved in each of these projects. He is particularly focused on translating basic science discoveries from his group into therapies and diagnostic tools relevant to respiratory medicine.  Specific projects include new therapies for severe asthma and other obstructive lung diseases; and for opioid-induced respiratory depression and other causes of apnea.  Novel diagnostics include technologies for measuring airway inflammation and vascular S-nitrosothiol delivery.  In recent work, he has discovered an important role for pulmonary androgen receptor expression in asthma; this appears to have important therapeutic implications.  Recent discoveries also include the role of the voltage-gated potassium channel in stereoselective S-nitrosocysteine signaling.

Dr. Gaston went to medical school at the University of Virginia.  He served in the US Navy aboard the USS Iwo Jima and at Naval Hospital, Camp Lejeune.  He developed a keen interest in studying respiratory diseases when he was a general pediatrician.  He did a research-intensive fellowship at Boston Children’s Hospital.  Since then, he has had over 190 publications and is an inventor on many patents.  He has helped to start five companies that are currently active. He has trained over 20 pre-doctoral students and mentored over 25 successful post-doctoral trainees.  He is currently Vice Chair for Translational Research at the Riley Children’s Hospital, the IU Department of Pediatrics and the Wells Center for Pediatric Research; and he has a pediatric pulmonology practice at Riley.