Grant: CIHR Fellowship

Cardiovascular (CV) disease negatively affects the heart and blood vessels, and is one of the leading causes of death worldwide. Although advancing age is the strongest risk-factor for CV disease, many other contributing factors exist, including: physical (in)activity, poor nutrition, and a lack of access to healthcare. In addition, social adversities (e.g. hardship within an individual's social environment) such as loneliness, low social status and experiencing a tough childhood, can also profoundly impact our CV health and survival. While the exact mechanisms of how social adversity gets 'under the skin' remain unknown, research suggests that these social challenges can weaken our immune system and alter our genes which in turn impact heart health. Research in this area is extremely challenging since, in humans, social adversity often coincides with other risk factors that can be harmful to health. Non-human primates, however, are an important translational model that can inform CV disease in humans. Rhesus macaques are biologically similar to humans, and experience similar social dynamics related to status, loneliness, and early life challenges arising from their hierarchical communities. This project will leverage existing expertise and infrastructure at the Caribbean Primate Research Centre (CPRC) to longitudinally examine the influence of social adversity on CV disease, and to advance current understanding of the biological mechanisms involved. To address these aims, an interdisciplinary approach will combine detailed CV health data with robust social and behavioral metrics (e.g., dominance, connectedness and early life hardships) and markers of physiologic stress (e.g., hormonal alterations, inflammation and molecular modifications). This project will help to unravel the connection between life challenges and CV disease, and could provide valuable insights into how we can protect our CV health in the face of social adversity.