In my lab, we studied the mechanisms that control the process of blood clotting and the links between the controls of blood clotting and inflammation. Blood clots are the cause of many serious human diseases, including heart attacks, strokes, pulmonary emboli, and venous thrombosis (phlebitis). They contribute to the mortality and morbidity of septic shock, acute trauma injury, and some of the complications of diabetes. To understand why abnormal clots occur, we examined the mechanisms by which the normal blood-clotting system is regulated and compare the regulation under normal circumstances to the pathogenic circumstance. To accomplish this, we sought to (1) identify new factors that are involved in regulating the blood-clotting process, (2) understand how the proteins function in the control of the process, (3) understand how the genes are regulated, (4) examine the influence of defects in the function of the proteins on the human disease process, (5) examine the influence of inhibition of the function of the proteins in animal models of human disease, (6) use crystallographic and biophysical techniques to determine the molecular structure of the proteins and complexes, and (7) determine how the regulatory proteins of the coagulation system control inflammation, and vice versa.