Margaret A. Vizzard

Areas of expertise

The Vizzard laboratory research interests concern the neural control, organization, electrical and neurochemical properties of urinary bladder and how these properties are altered following neural injury, disease or during early postnatal development. Current rodent models of bladder dysfunction include: spinal cord injury, peripheral nerve injury, acute and chronic bladder inflammation, bladder pain syndrome, Parkinson’s disease and partial bladder outlet obstruction. The Vizzard laboratory defines the changes that occur with injury/disease or postnatal maturation and then determines what factors control and regulate these plastic changes. We aim to define interventional strategies that improve bladder function in the face of neural injury or disease. Within the Vizzard lab, we emphasize the contribution of neuropeptides and growth factors to voiding dysfunction as well as an emerging interest in the role of TRP channels. A more recent project is a collaboration among colleagues in Neurological Sciences, Psychology, and Chemistry at UVM that focuses on the role(s) of pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating polypeptide (PACAP) in stress-induced urinary bladder dysfunction.

The Vizzard laboratory uses a multidisciplinary approach to address the above questions. Some of these techniques and approaches include: conventional and transneuronal tracing using neurotropic viruses (e.g., pseudorabies virus and herpes simplex virus-type to map bladder reflex circuitry in health and disease; immunostaining for neuroactive compounds to determine if the balance of neuroactive compounds is altered to push the system into an overactive or underactive mode of operation; biochemical and molecular approaches to determine what factors may be altered centrally (spinal cord) or peripherally (dorsal root ganglia, pelvic ganglia, urinary bladder); whole-cell patch clamp and intracellular recording from dorsal root or pelvic ganglion cells to determine if cells are more or less excitable in health or disease; whole animal bladder function testing to evaluate the effects of interventional strategies on bladder function in health and disease; in vitro analyses of urinary bladder strips to assess spontaneous and stimulation evoked changes in contractility; calcium imaging of urothelial cells in urothelium strips; ex vivo assays to examine release of ATP from the urothelium with distention.