Marcelle Dina Zita
Marcelle Dina Zita earned the Toffler Scholar Award in 2023 at Johns Hopkins University
Biography
Marcelle Dina Zita was born and raised in Yaoundé, Cameroon. Her mother is a retired teacher and her father, who passed away when she was only two, was a member of the Cameroon Armed Forces. Dr. Dina Zita has a younger sister, but, because there is a nine-year age gap between the two, she essentially grew up as an only child. She also had a younger brother, but he died at the age of five due to complications from a neurological disease. Helping to care for him and trying to understand his condition greatly influenced Dr. Dina Zita’s eventual decision to go into medicine.
As the daughter of a dedicated public school teacher who stressed the importance of education, Dr. Dina Zita took her schoolwork seriously. Yet music was her true passion. She dreamed of becoming a singer one day, and she would often entertain herself by singing, dancing, and listening to music.
As a high school student, Dr. Dina Zita studied STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). After graduating high school, she attended a public university in Yaoundé where she earned her undergraduate degree in biochemistry. While Dr. Dina Zita was applying to local medical schools, one of her mom’s colleagues attended her daughter’s graduation from the University of Arkansas in Little Rock (UALR). The colleague raved about the school and recommended that Dr. Dina Zita’s mother send her daughter to the States to pursue her graduate degree. Her mom was reluctant, but the idea thrilled Dr. Dina Zita. She begged her mother to let her go, and eventually, she agreed. Dr. Dina Zita was accepted to UALR, secured her visa, and moved to Little Rock. She was 17.
When she started her studies at UALR, Dr. Dina Zita was concerned that the pressures of attending medical school in the U.S. might be too intense for her. So she opted to pursue a B.S. in Nursing, thinking that it would be a good compromise. It wasn’t. So halfway through earning her nursing degree, she changed her major to Biology and her minor to Chemistry to shift to a pre-med track.
Dr. Dina Zita’s coursework offered a research elective, so she began working in the lab of Dr. John Bush during the summer.
She quickly discovered she loved research and decided to pursue an M.D. Ph.D., which would allow her to be a researching doctor. After graduating, Dr. Dina Zita worked as a research tech in Dr. Kevin Young’s microbiology lab at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS). Dr. Dina Zita was accepted to a UAMS Ph.D. program and decided to attend, fully intending to find a way to pursue her dual degree.
Influenced by her childhood experience with her brother, she elected to join the UAMS Department of Neurobiology and Neuroscience. As began rotating in the labs, Dr. Dina Zita discovered it wasn’t a good fit. She asked her friend and mentor William McCain for his advice, and he told her to talk with virologist Dr. Karl Boehme in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. The two met and, soon after, Dr. Dina Zita was working in the Boehm Lab, investigating mechanisms of reovirus-induced cardiac pathology. Under the mentorship of Dr. Boehme, Dr. Dina Zita completed her Ph.D. in Microbiology and Immunology.
Today, Dr. Dina Zita is a post-doctoral research fellow in the laboratory of Luigi Adamo, M.D., Ph.D. in the Johns Hopkins Division of Cardiology in the Department of Medicine. Dr. Dina Zita’s research focuses on elucidating inflammatory immune-mediated responses that drive autoimmune pediatric cardiac pathology to aid in the development of novel therapeutics for children suffering from autoimmune myocarditis.
“Researchers are simply trying to figure out the ‘how’— how things work or how they stop working the way they're supposed to. So when we look at a disease like myocarditis, we’re trying to figure out how we can recreate it because, when we can do that, then we can begin to explore and test viable treatments and therapies.”
- Marcelle Dina Zita, PhD
BIOGRAPHY
Marcelle Dina Zita was born and raised in Yaoundé, Cameroon. Her mother is a retired teacher and her father, who passed away when she was only two, was a member of the Cameroon Armed Forces. Dr. Dina Zita has a younger sister, but, because there is a nine-year age gap between the two, she essentially grew up as an only child. She also had a younger brother, but he died at the age of five due to complications from a neurological disease. Helping to care for him and trying to understand his condition greatly influenced Dr. Dina Zita’s eventual decision to go into medicine.
As the daughter of a dedicated public school teacher who stressed the importance of education, Dr. Dina Zita took her schoolwork seriously. Yet music was her true passion. She dreamed of becoming a singer one day, and she would often entertain herself by singing, dancing, and listening to music.
As a high school student, Dr. Dina Zita studied STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). After graduating high school, she attended a public university in Yaoundé where she earned her undergraduate degree in biochemistry. While Dr. Dina Zita was applying to local medical schools, one of her mom’s colleagues attended her daughter’s graduation from the University of Arkansas in Little Rock (UALR). The colleague raved about the school and recommended that Dr. Dina Zita’s mother send her daughter to the States to pursue her graduate degree. Her mom was reluctant, but the idea thrilled Dr. Dina Zita. She begged her mother to let her go, and eventually, she agreed. Dr. Dina Zita was accepted to UALR, secured her visa, and moved to Little Rock. She was 17.
When she started her studies at UALR, Dr. Dina Zita was concerned that the pressures of attending medical school in the U.S. might be too intense for her. So she opted to pursue a B.S. in Nursing, thinking that it would be a good compromise. It wasn’t. So halfway through earning her nursing degree, she changed her major to Biology and her minor to Chemistry to shift to a pre-med track.
Dr. Dina Zita’s coursework offered a research elective, so she began working in the lab of Dr. John Bush during the summer. She quickly discovered she loved research and decided to pursue an M.D. Ph.D., which would allow her to be a researching doctor. After graduating, Dr. Dina Zita worked as a research tech in Dr. Kevin Young’s microbiology lab at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS). Dr. Dina Zita was accepted to a UAMS Ph.D. program and decided to attend, fully intending to find a way to pursue her dual degree.
Influenced by her childhood experience with her brother, she elected to join the UAMS Department of Neurobiology and Neuroscience. As began rotating in the labs, Dr. Dina Zita discovered it wasn’t a good fit. She asked her friend and mentor William McCain for his advice, and he told her to talk with virologist Dr. Karl Boehme in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. The two met and, soon after, Dr. Dina Zita was working in the Boehm Lab, investigating mechanisms of reovirus-induced cardiac pathology. Under the mentorship of Dr. Boehme, Dr. Dina Zita completed her Ph.D. in Microbiology and Immunology.
Today, Dr. Dina Zita is a post-doctoral research fellow in the laboratory of Luigi Adamo, M.D., Ph.D. in the Johns Hopkins Division of Cardiology in the Department of Medicine. Dr. Dina Zita’s research focuses on elucidating inflammatory immune-mediated responses that drive autoimmune pediatric cardiac pathology to aid in the development of novel therapeutics for children suffering from autoimmune myocarditis.
“Researchers are simply trying to figure out the ‘how’— how things work or how they stop working the way they're supposed to. So when we look at a disease like myocarditis, we’re trying to figure out how we can recreate it because, when we can do that, then we can begin to explore and test viable treatments and therapies.”
- Marcelle Dina Zita, PhD
Research Focus
Challenges
Pediatric myocarditis is inflammation and weakness of the heart muscle in infants and young children. The disease is typically caused by a viral infection that reaches the heart, such as influenza or rhinovirus, which elicits an immune response that results in inflammation. Children living with myocarditis experience broad-ranging symptoms, including fatigue, chest pain, and difficulty breathing. In more serious cases, it can lead to congestive heart failure and myocardial infarction.
There is no known cure for pediatric myocarditis. Often by the time a child is diagnosed, the disease has advanced too far to enable a full recovery. For these children, the damage to their heart tissue is too severe, so physicians are required to focus on providing treatments and therapies that focus on lessening the severity of the side effects.
Focus and Priorities
Although we know that viruses typically cause pediatric myocarditis, the specific mechanisms within those viruses that enable them to infect the heart are not. It’s equally unclear why the impact and side effects of the disease differ so dramatically. Some children recover completely, while others develop a chronic condition, with impact on quality of life ranging from mild to life-threatening.
Through her research, Dr. Dina Zita is hoping to determine the inflammatory mechanisms within a virus that activate the body’s autoimmune response as well as those that determine the severity of that response.
Benefits
Dr. Dina Zita is working to identify and isolate the viral mechanisms that not only result in myocarditis, but also determine the severity of the body’s autoimmune response. She believes that if they can identify these mechanisms, researchers can begin exploring therapies to prevent and treat pediatric myocarditis before it advances to become a chronic, life-limiting condition. Her ultimate goal: to help design a treatment regimen or strategy that cures pediatric myocarditis.
Karen Toffler Charitable Trust Investment
Funding from the Karen Toffler Charitable Trust will enable Dr. Dina Zita to develop a new mouse model for autoimmune pediatric myocarditis research. Once developed, she will be able to begin conducting studies to determine what particular gene segments are associated with no myocarditis, non-lethal myocarditis, and lethal myocarditis. Once she’s able to identify these gene segments, she’ll be equipped to conduct even more focused research to ascertain what specific mechanisms and pathways impact the severity of the condition.
Once she has compiled these profiles, she will be able to use them to analyze blood samples from pediatric myocarditis patients with varying levels of the disease. She hopes that, by looking at genetic markers across these samples, she can begin experimenting with the mouse model to recapitulate these patient profiles. When she is able to do that, she will have successfully enabled medical researchers to begin exploring ways to target and neutralize these disease-causing mechanisms.
Karen Toffler Charitable Trust Investment
Funding from the Karen Toffler Charitable Trust will enable Dr. Dina Zita to develop a new mouse model for autoimmune pediatric myocarditis research. Once developed, she will be able to begin conducting studies to determine what particular gene segments are associated with no myocarditis, non-lethal myocarditis, and lethal myocarditis. Once she’s able to identify these gene segments, she’ll be equipped to conduct even more focused research to ascertain what specific mechanisms and pathways impact the severity of the condition.
Once she has compiled these profiles, she will be able to use them to analyze blood samples from pediatric myocarditis patients with varying levels of the disease. She hopes that, by looking at genetic markers across these samples, she can begin experimenting with the mouse model to recapitulate these patient profiles. When she is able to do that, she will have successfully enabled medical researchers to begin exploring ways to target and neutralize these disease-causing mechanisms.
“Usually by the time children are diagnosed with pediatric myocarditis, the disease is so advanced that all you can do is treat the symptoms. You can try to lower the inflammation, but you cannot get rid of it because you don’t know when or how it started or progressed. This chronic unfolding of the disease is the piece that’s missing, and it’s what our research is trying to understand.”
- Marcelle Dina Zita, PhD