Covington Who's Who Selects Paula Saa as an Honored Member of the Executive and Professional Registry

HOLLYWOOD, FL, September 29, 2012 (Press-News.org) Paula Saa, Scientist II for the American Red Cross, has been selected as an Honored Member of the Covington Who's Who Executive and Professional Registry. The selection recognizes Paula Saa's commitment to excellence in Non-Profit.

Saa, who holds a Bachelor's Degree in Biology from the University of Vigo in Spain, followed by a PhD in Molecular Biology from the Autonomous University of Madrid, has focused the last twelve years of her career focusing on the study of neurodegenerative diseases and, in particular, Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies (TSE), which include among others, the bovine spongiform encephalopathy in cows and the Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) in
humans.

Having centered her career at investigating the mechanisms of prion replication and transmission, Saa works in the laboratory working in the development of early, minimally-invasive diagnostic methods to determine the presence of the infectious prion protein and disease biomarkers in the blood of affected patients during the pre-symptomatic phase of the disease. She is currently investigating the potential risk of chronic wasting disease (CWD) transmission to human beings, as well as the risk of iatrogenic transmission through blood transfusions.

"I became interested in prions from the very first time I heard about these unconventional agents during my initial college years," Saa explained about her career choice. "For this reason, I devoted my pre- and post-doctoral training appointments to acquire expertise and knowledge about prions and their mechanisms of replication."

Notably, a prion, derived from the words protein and infection, propagate by transmitting a misfolded protein state. All known prion diseases affect the structure of the brain or other neural tissue and all are currently untreatable and universally fatal.

Saa co-invented a new biochemical system to replicate prions in vitro, the Protein Misfolding Cyclic Amplification (PMCA). She has successfully applied this new technology to investigate several phenomena associated with prion diseases, including the study of the biological barrier between mammalian species for prion propagation and the molecular basis of prion strain diversity. She has been published in numerous scientific journals, and in national and international media.

Covington Who's Who specializes in providing members with pertinent biographical information of key Executives and Professionals that comprise its membership Worldwide. Covington Who's Who encourages all members to use the publication to contact and network with other members to enhance public relations or possibly develop mutual and beneficial business relationships.

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