Posted on December 7, 2001 at 10:50 a.m.

BIRMINGHAM, AL — Suzanne Oparil, M.D., a renowned cardiologist and professor of medicine at UAB, has been named a 2002 distinguished lecturer for the American Physiology Society.

Recipients of the distinguished lectureships are chosen by the 12 APS Disciplinary Sections as outstanding contributors and representatives of the best research within their field. Awardees actively participate in the Experimental Biology meeting, which will be held next year in New Orleans, April 20-24. Awardees present lectures and meet with graduate and postdoctoral students during the meeting.

Oparil received the Carl Ludwig Distinguished Lectureship, given by the Neural Control and Autonomic Regulation Section. She will present her lecture, “The Anterior Hypothalamic Area: Gatekeeper in the Pathogenesis of Salt-Sensitive Hypotension,” on April 21. The lecture is a continuation of her renowned research on the identification of a region of the brain that plays a critical role in determining the body’s response to dietary salt.

Oparil is an internationally known cardiologist and hypertension researcher and past-president of the American Heart Association. She has devoted her career to studying the causes of hypertension and vascular disease.

She was the first to show that angiotensin II, a small molecule that can cause hypertension and cardiac enlargement, is produced in the blood vessels of the lung. Her seminal research provided a rationale for developing ACE inhibitors, used widely today in patients with hypertension, heart failure and heart attacks.