A Deafness Research Foundation (DRF) grant recipient since 2007, Tamara Alliston’s interest in research began while an undergraduate at Trinity University in San Antonio. When asked how she became interested in research, Alliston replies that it was “serendipitous and unanticipated.” At Trinity University, Alliston’s professor and mentor Jim Shinkle, Ph.D., strongly influenced her study of biology and encouraged her to participate in a summer research program. In addition to her interest in biology, Alliston had a love of teaching.
She went on to receive her doctorate from Baylor College of Medicine in cell biology. It was in those years that Alliston discovered her real passion – research. Her interest in studying the cause of hearing loss was motivated by her advisor at Baylor, JoAnne Richards, Ph.D., who suffered from significant hearing loss acquired as an adult. An additional personal connection with hearing loss is Alliston’s brother-in–law, who suffered severe hearing loss as a child, most probably from incorrectly prescribed antibiotics.
Alliston has received DRF funding for two consecutive years for her project, “The Role of Cochlear Capsule Bone Remodeling in Hearing Loss.” She and co-investigator Lawrence Lustig, M.D., associate professor and director, Otology, Neurotology & Skull Base Surgery, University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), seek to understand the mechanisms by which bone defects cause sensorineural hearing loss that is associated with several diseases, including otosclerosis, Paget’s disease, osteogenesis imperfecta and others.
Bone remodeling is the physiologic process used by vertebrates to maintain a constant bone mass and to renew bone throughout life. It is comprised of two phases, resorption of pre-existing bone tissues by the osteoclasts, followed by new bone formation by the osteoblasts. Thus, the regulation of bone remodeling involves molecules that control differentiation and function of two very different and complex cell types. Bones in the inner ear are unique in that they are protected from bone remodeling. When disease compromises this protection, the result is hearing loss.
This line of research was preceded by another collaboration of special significance to Alliston, because it involved her husband, Jacob Johnson, M.D., an otolaryngologist by training. One afternoon some years ago while Johnson was studying for board exams, Alliston’s own work was spread out over the living room floor. As Johnson worked to memorize every disease that causes hearing loss, the idea emerged that the gene RUNX2 might be important in hearing, although it had never been implicated in hearing loss before in research literature. The idea was the seed of Johnson’s residency research project with Anil Lalwani, M.D., in which they investigated hearing loss in mice and humans with insufficient RUNX2 function. Later, under the guidance of Alliston and Lustig, Jolie Chang, M.D., a first-year resident in Otology, Neurotology & Skull Base Surgery at UCSF, made great strides on this project and provided the foundation for Alliston’s work that is supported by DRF.
Much progress has been made over the years since then and Alliston will soon publish research results that will contribute to the future prevention of hearing loss associated with bone defects.
