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Professor Dunja Aksentijevic

Dunja

Professor of Cardiovascular Physiology and Metabolism, Wellcome Trust Career Re-Entry Fellow, Director of Education WHRI

Centre: Biochemical Pharmacology

Email: d.aksentijevic@qmul.ac.uk
Telephone: +44(0) 20 7882 5920
Twitter: @dunjaaks

Profile

Programme Lead
MSc Clinical Drug Development, MSc Healthcare Research Methods, MRes Clinical Research

Dunja Aksentijevic is Professor of Cardiovascular Physiology and Metabolism at the William Harvey Research Institute, Queen Mary University of London. Dunja graduated from the University of Hull in 2004 with a BSc (Hons First Class) in Biomedical Science and was the recipient of the Faculty of Science Academic Scholarship. She was awarded the University of Hull Frederick Atkinson Prize Scholarship and NHS Renal Research Fund Fellowship for her doctoral studies to examine myocardial insulin resistance in chronic kidney disease. Immediately upon completion of her doctoral thesis in 2008, she joined the group of Prof Stefan Neubauer at the Radcliffe Department of Medicine, University of Oxford.

Her first postdoctoral position focused on investigating the therapeutic potential of modulating myocardial energetics in heart failure. In 2013, she moved to King’s College London, The Rayne Institute, St Thomas Hospital as the senior research fellow in the laboratory of Prof Michael Shattock to study impact of sodium modulation on heart metabolism. In 2017 Dunja was appointed Lecturer in Physiology/Biochemistry at the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London. In 2020, she joined William Harvey Research Institute (British Heart Foundation Accelerator Fellow) and in 2021 received her Wellcome Trust Career Development Fellowship. 

Current roles include Programme Lead for MSc Clinical Drug Development, MSc Healthcare Research Methods, MRes Clinical Research, Academic Visitor University of Oxford, Honorary Research Fellow King’s College London.

Awards and Honours

  • British Society for Cardiovascular Research, Committee Member
  • International Academy of Sciences and Arts Bosnia and Herzegovina, Corresponding Member
  • Queen Mary Education Excellence Award (Biomedical Science)
  • Bosnian-Herzegovinian American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Corresponding Member
  • Queen Mary Faculty of Science and Engineering, Education Excellence Award
  • Teaching Excellence Award in Biomedical Science, School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London
  • Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
  • Fellow of the Institute of Biomedical Science
  • Fellow of the European Society of Cardiology  

Other

Research

Join the group
Do you enjoy cardiac metabolism research? Please send us an email if you are interested in exploring opportunities.

We are keen to recruit talented PhD students to join our group. We welcome applications from talented potential postdoctoral researchers. We encourage potential applicants to secure fellowship funding.

Research group members (current and alumni)
Dr Megan Young; Dr Loucia Karatzia; Fenn Cullen; Dr Ivana Iveljic; Dr Zorana Staka; Sanushi Thamasha; Dambure Vithanachchi; Shing Hei Lam; Kimia Jarrah; Silvia Fanti (co-supervisor); Fariha Akter; Umar Hoque Chowdhury; Nayan Dhokia; Molly Horsfield

Summary

Heart failure affects over 64 million people worldwide, with few effective treatments available, therefore it is an enormous global medical and economic burden. Defects in cardiac metabolism are a major cause of heart failure, but this area has not been intensively investigated. Therefore, cardiac metabolism is a promising, unexplored subject for the development of novel therapies.

My research aims to determine how metabolic remodelling contributes to the pathophysiology of heart failure and from this develop novel therapies targeting metabolism. Ongoing projects include:

  1. The role of chronic inflammation in cardiac metabolic dysfunction in type 2 diabetes (Wellcome Trust Career Re-Entry Fellowship)
  2. Identification of novel metabolic therapeutic strategies to treat HF including replenishment of metabolic intermediates and modification of mitochondrial substrate utilization
  3. Cellular mechanism of cardiac metabolic derangement during chronic kidney disease.
  4. Impact of the pregnancy conditions on cardiometabolic syndrome and heart failure in the offspring.

To investigate these areas, I have developed techniques which integrate physiology with NMR spectroscopy (23Na, 31P, 13C, 1H) that enable assessment of cardiac metabolism in situ. Furthermore, my recently awarded Wellcome Trust Fellowship (in partnership with AstraZeneca) will focus on heart failure due to chronic inflammation driven by systemic metabolic stress in type 2 diabetes.

Key Publications

Full list of publications 

  1. Faulkes CG, Eykyn TR, Miljkovic JL, Gilbert JD, Charles RL, Prag HA, Patel N, Hart DW, Murphy MP, Bennett NC, Aksentijevic D. Naked mole-rats have distinctive cardiometabolic and genetic adaptations to their underground low-oxygen lifestyles. Nat Commun. 2024 Mar 27;15(1):2204.
  2. Karatzia L, Aung N, Aksentijevic D. Artificial intelligence in cardiology: Hope for the future and power for the present. Front Cardiovasc Med. 2022 Oct 13;9:945726. doi: 10.3389/fcvm.2022.945726.
  3. Prag, H. A., Aksentijevic, D., et al. (2022). Ischemia-Selective Cardioprotection by Malonate for Ischemia/Reperfusion Injury.  Circulation research, 131(6), 528–541.
  4. Patel, N., Yaqoob, M. M., & Aksentijevic, D. (2022). Cardiac metabolic remodelling in chronic kidney disease.  Nature reviews. Nephrology, 18(8), 524–537.
  5. McClements, L., Richards, C., Patel, N., Chen, H., Sesperez, K., Bubb, K. J., Karlstaedt, A., & Aksentijevic, D. (2022). Impact of reduced uterine perfusion pressure model of preeclampsia on metabolism of placenta, maternal and fetal hearts.  Scientific reports, 12(1), 1111.
  6. Henson, S. M., & Aksentijevic, D; (2021). Senescence and Type 2 Diabetic Cardiomyopathy: How Young Can You Die of Old Age? Frontiers in Pharmacology, 12, 716517.
  7. Aksentijević D, Shattock MJ. With a grain of salt: Sodium elevation and metabolic remodelling in heart failure.  J Mol Cell Cardiol. 2021 Aug 8;161:106-115. doi: 10.1016/j.yjmcc.2021.08.003.
  8. Aksentijevic et al. (2020) “Intracellular sodium elevation reprograms cardiac metabolism”, Nature Communications,11(1), 1-14.
  9. Prag, HA. Gruszczyk VA. Beach, TE, Young, T. Huang, MM. Tronci, L. Ascione, R. Hadjichambi, A. Shattock, MJ. Pellerin, L,Krieg, T., Saeb-Parsy, K., Frezza, C.  James, AM.  Murphy, MP. Aksentijevic, D. (2020) Mechanism of succinate efflux upon reperfusion of the ischaemic heart, Cardiovascular Research, doi:10.1093/cvr/cvaa148.
  10. Aksentijevic D. Zervou S. McAndrew D. Eykyn TR et al. (2020) Age-dependent decline in cardiac function in guanidinoacetate-N-methytransferase knockout mice”, Frontiers in Physiology, 10:1535.
  11. Faulkes*, CG. Eykyn*, Aksentijevic D (2019) Letters in Biology “Cardiac metabolomic profile of the naked mole rat-glycogen to the rescue”, 15 (11) 20190710.
  12. Eykyn, TR.* Aksentijevic, D.* et al. (2015) Multiple quantum filtered 23Na NMR revisited: Ratio of Triple/ Double quantum filtered signals correlate with [Nai] in the Langendorff perfused mouse heart *authors contributed 
equally 
Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology 86:95-101.
  13. Aksentijevic, D. et al. (2014) Cardiac dysfunction and peri-weaning mortality in malonyl-coenzyme A decarboxylase (MCD) knockout mice as a consequence of restricting substrate plasticity. 
 Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology 75:76-87
  14. Chouchani E.* Pell V.* Gaude E. Aksentijevic, D. et al. (2014) Ischaemic accumulation of succinate controls reperfusion injury through mitochondrial ROS. Nature, 515(7527):431-5.
  15. Lygate, CA. Aksentijevic, D. et al. (2013) Living without creatine: Unchanged voluntary exercise capacity and response to chronic myocardial infarction in creatine-deficient mice Circulation Research 112:945-955
  16. Aksentijevic D. et al. (2010) High energy phosphotransfer in the failing mouse heart: role of adenylate kinase and glycolytic enzymes European Journal of Heart Failure 12:1282-1289
  17. Aksentijevic, D. Bhandari, S. Seymour, A. M. (2009) Insulin resistance and altered glucose transporter 4 expression in experimental uremia Kidney International 75: 711-8.

Sponsors

Collaborators

Queen Mary University of London

UK

  • Prof Michael Murphy (University of Cambridge)
  • Prof Thomas Krieg (University of Cambridge)
  • Prof Michael Shattock (King’s College London)
  • Dr Thomas Eykyn (King’s College London)
  • Dr Dave Smith (Astra Zeneca UK)
  • Prof Damian Tyler (University of Oxford)

International

  • Prof Jack Miller (University of Aarhus) 
  • Dr Lana McClements (University of Technology, Sydney, Australia)
  • Prof Christoffer Laustsen (University of Aarhus, Denmark)
  • Prof Heinrich Taegtmeyer (University of Texas, USA)
  • Prof Anja Karlstaedt (Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre, Los Angeles, USA)

News

Webinars

European Society of Cardiology "Metabolic aspects of heart failure" Live Online Event of the ESC WG on Cellular Biology of the Heart

(2020) ISHR Cardiovascular Webinar Series “Is there a causal link between intracellular Na elevation and cardiac metabolic remodeling?”

BH Futures Foundations Webinar, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina 

Radio and Television Bosnia and Herzegovina BHT1

International Interview

Aksentijević: Normalna koncentracija natrijuma ključna za zdravo srce - Al Jazeera, 23 February 2021



BBC World

Publication Press Releases

International Media

Teaching

Teaching Fellow: Zenouska Ramchunder
Teaching Assistant: Dr Sajeel Shah

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