CUIMC Update - March 13, 2024
CUIMC Update is a weekly e-newsletter featuring medical center news and the accomplishments of our faculty, staff, and trainees. Please send your news, honors, and awards to cuimc_update@cumc.columbia.edu. Grants are provided by the Sponsored Projects Administration office.
News
ICYMI: The VP&S Strategic Plan(link is external and opens in a new window)
Last week, VP&S Dean Katrina Armstrong, MD, distributed the new VP&S strategic plan, intended to reestablish priorities for building the medical school’s future, energize institutional initiatives, and create mechanisms for accountability.
Same-Day Sick Visits Available for CUIMC Employees
Medical center employees can now schedule sick visits for the same day or other health appointments, including annual physicals, within a week with the ColumbiaDoctors Nurse Practitioners Group, which has a block of appointments reserved every day for CUIMC employees.
Stay Safe During Spring Cleaning
With the itch for spring cleaning in the air, learn more about home cleaning products and their possible hazards from Adam Blumenberg, MD, assistant professor of emergency medicine at VP&S, who has additional expertise in toxicology.
More Schooling Linked to Slowed Aging and Increased Longevity
A study by researchers at the Mailman School of Public Health and the Robert N. Butler Columbia Aging Center is the first to connect educational mobility with the pace of biological aging and mortality.
Putting Research into Action at HICCC: Community Outreach and Engagement
The community outreach and engagement office connects the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center and the population it serves, putting research into action through events and programs. Maya Lipsman, pictured, senior project coordinator, and Nicole Bayne, project manager, discuss how the office works to understand the needs of the communities and patients served by the center.
Events
- Anti-Racism Speaker Series: Dr. Kelli Stidham Hall
March 14, 10 a.m.
Online - CSCI Seminar Series with Sharon Gerecht, PhD
March 14, 11:30 a.m.
Hammer Health Sciences Center, 701 W. 168 St., Room 401 - Women Who Advocate for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
March 14, 5 p.m.
VP&S Building, 630 W. 168 St., Faculty Club, 4th Floor - Call for Abstracts: 2024 Columbia University Postdoctoral Research Symposium
March 18
Online - Entering Mentoring: Maintaining Effective Communication
March 19, 10 a.m.
Online - Getting to Campus: Travel Tips for Columbians Living in or Near NYC
March 20, 1 p.m.
Online - Levin Lecture Series: Dr. Thomas Richardson
March 21, 11:45 a.m.
Allan Rosenfield Building, 722 W. 168 St., 8th Floor Auditorium - Purim on Haven
March 25, noon
Haven Plaza, Haven Avenue between Fort Washington Avenue and 169 Street - 2024 Columbia University Career Expo
March 26, 9 a.m.
The Forum at Columbia University, 601 W. 125 St. - Women in Science: Lessons from the Past and Promise for the Future
March 26, 4 p.m.
Online - Dr. Lorna M. Breen Annual Lecture: “Listening in the Dark: Harnessing our Intuition for Resilience and Empowerment” with Amber Tamblyn(link is external and opens in a new window)
April 17, 11 a.m.
Black Building, 650 W. 168 St., Alumni Auditorium and online via Zoom - CUIMC Healthspan Extension Summit
April 19, 1 p.m.
Vagelos Education Center, 104 Haven Ave., Room 201
Grants
School of Nursing
- Patricia Stone, PhD
$2,652,119 over four years from the National Institute of Nursing Research for "Health Disparities in Hospice in Nursing Homes."
Mailman School of Public Health
- Wafaa El-Sadr, MD, ICAP
$60,000,000 over five years from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for "Regional Partnerships to Strengthen National Data Capacities for HIV, TB, and Other Pandemic Preparedness and Response under PEPFAR." - Pia Mauro, PhD, Epidemiology
$3,457,257 over five years from the National Institute on Drug Abuse for "Substance use treatment and county incarceration: Reducing inequities in substance use treatment need, availability, use, and outcomes."
Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons
- Eric Greene, PhD, Biochemistry & Molecular Biophysics
$377,375 over four years from the National Cancer Institute for "Role of nuclear chaperones in genomic instability and carcinogenesis." - Rebecca Haeusler, PhD, Medicine
$2,595,594 over four years from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases for "Insulin regulation of hepatic transport." - Tal Nuriel, PhD, Taub Institute
$4,107,842 over five years from the National Institute on Aging for "Investigating the role of long-term latent herpes simplex virus infection on APOE4-associated Alzheimer's disease pathogenesis." - Ayesha Sania, ScD, Psychiatry
$757,993 over five years from Fogarty International Center for "Sleep health of preschool children in Bangladesh: predictors, role on executive function and obesity, and sleep promotion intervention." - Stephen Tsang, MD, PhD, Ophthalmology
$1,623,480 over four years from the National Eye Institute for "Gene Editing and Silencing in Phototransduction." - Moriya Tsuji, MD, PhD, Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center
$1,136,124 over two years from Leyden Laboratories for "In vitro activity of 7DW8-5 in different formulations."
Honors
- Donald W. Landry, MD, PhD, Medicine
Has been elected to the board of directors for The Center for Discovery(link is external and opens in a new window). - Martin Picard, PhD, Psychiatry and Neurology
Is the inaugural winner of the Baszucki Prize in Science(link is external and opens in a new window). Read more about Picard's research. - Abin Sajan, MD, Radiology
Will present one of four abstracts selected for 2024 Abstract of the Year by the Society of Interventional Radiology. - Taylor B. Sewell, MD, Pediatrics
Was named the 2024-2025 Vanneck-Bailey Scholar by the Virginia Apgar Academy of Medical Educators. - Myrna Weissman, PhD, Psychiatry
Is the recipient of the Women in Medicine Legacy Foundation’s Alma Dea Morani Award(link is external and opens in a new window).
Social Media Snapshot
In the News Highlights
- These Electric Fish Detect Images of What Their Companions Are ‘Seeing’(link is external and opens in a new window)
Mar 6, 2024
Scientific American
“We were excited to see that the electrical pulses [of other fish] are not just some background noise,” says Nathaniel Sawtell, a neuroscientist at Columbia University and a co-author of the new paper. “The fish are actually using the pulses of the other fish to their benefit.” - Prisoners in Texas and Florida Face Biggest Risk of Increasingly Deadly Heat(link is external and opens in a new window)
Mar 5, 2024
The Guardian
Deadly heat is threatening the lives of America’s ageing incarcerated population, who are trapped in increasingly hot and humid conditions as the climate emergency escalates, new research has found. “Prisons and other detention facilities are located in disproportionately hotter places because the idea of incarcerated people suffering from heat fits the retribution and punishment ethos of the US system,” said co-author Robbie Parks, assistant professor of environmental health sciences at Columbia University. - Two Clinical Trials Test Cheap Pills to Extend Life(link is external and opens in a new window)
Feb 23, 2024
Worth Magazine
But the Columbia-led study is focussed on a specific part of the body: ovaries. They deteriorate faster with age than other organs. If rapamycin can slow the process, it might put off menopause, and its attendant health challenges, till later in life. Dr. Yousin Suh leads the study, called VIBRANT: Validating Benefits of Rapamycin for Reproductive Aging Treatment.