Project Summary/Abstract Candidate: Jasleen Minhas, MD is a pulmonary and critical care physician-scientist passionate about developing personalized interventions promoting physical activity to improve patient outcomes in PAH. She seeks didactic and experiential training to develop expertise in advanced statistical methods for multidimensional data, longitudinal data analysis, and qualitative methods to advance her career goals towards research independence. Research Context: Activity limitation is an early manifestation of PAH and often persists despite treatment. Patients with PAH prioritize the impact of disease on their daily physical activity over its effect on exercise capacity. However, PAH care focuses on improving exercise capacity as measured by the 6-minute walk test. Clinic-based tests do not capture the daily variability in functionality. This proposal uses a non-invasive biosensor device that continuously captures multiple data streams (including ECG, respiratory rate, and activity) to define the clinical implications of continuously measured cardiopulmonary measures and physical activity in the patient’s home environment. Additionally, we will assess patient’s attitudes and preferences toward behavioral interventions targeting physical activity. Specific Aims: 1) Identify determinants of patterns of heart rate and daily physical activity in PAH. 2) Phenotype patients by integrating cardiopulmonary and physical activity measures and determine the association of phenotypes with clinical outcomes. 3) Assess patient attitudes and preferences for activity-based interventions. Research Plan: Dr. Minhas will utilize data from the ACTiPH-VP study to accomplish these aims. She will identify predominant patterns of heart rate and physical activity using a multilevel functional principal component analysis and identify their determinants. She will then integrate cardiopulmonary measures with physical activity and utilize the Joint and Individual Variance explained method to identify novel phenotypes and investigate their association with clinical outcomes. For Aim 3, Dr. Minhas will use semi-structured interviews to assess patient attitudes towards physical activity, and their preferences for activity-based interventions. Career Development Plan: Working closely with her mentors and advisors, Dr. Minhas’s goals are to 1) expand expertise in advanced statistical methods and dimensionality reduction techniques for multidimensional data gathered by biosensor devices; 2) obtain skills to design, launch, monitor and troubleshoot a multisite, prospective study; and 3) gain proficiency in qualitative methods to elicit patient preferences. Additionally, she will remain heavily involved with the parent ACTiPH study, gaining skills in startup, oversight, and completion of a multisite, prospective cohort study of patients with PAH across the US. Environment: The University of Pennsylvania offers an ideal environment to pursue this training, with well- e...