Aspects of our education mission have received a little more attention than usual, both within the department and throughout the college, for the last few weeks. With all the expectations and the celebrations of Match Day, there is something that pairs well with spring. Both have a hopefulness for the future, which we try to give our students and trainees every day. There is also much to celebrate and be hopeful about in our research mission as well. I was cheered by Dean Denise Jamieson’s answer to a question about opportunities in research in the college last week during one of her town halls and the importance of collaboration. She acknowledged that Iowa’s culture and climate makes collaboration in research more possible than other institutions, but that we also need to be more narrowly strategic about which areas we want to develop. We should find the areas, she said, where there is overlap between areas with opportunity and areas where we already have an existing history of excellence. I think there is a strong case to be made for a number of areas within Internal Medicine that fit this bill.
One faculty member who has shown herself to be adept at collaborations is Dr. Sanjana Dayal.She has recently received her third R01, this one from the NHLBI. Her four-year, $2.3M grant will expand on her growing body of research in the overlap of cardiovascular medicine and gerontology. Her pilot data reveals protective effects of caloric restriction on age-related thrombosis, which, as she uncovers the mechanisms behind this, holds value for diabetes and other metabolic disorders. What I appreciated about this story about her grant is the recap of all her work with so many other researchers from other divisions within the department and even other departments and institutions. A great example for how to bring different areas together and build a project with unique strengths that sets us apart!
Collaborative research is undoubtedly the North Star we should all be orienting our ships around, but there is value in collaboration before the grant is even completed. One of our junior faculty members, Dr. Ajit Vikram, also received an NHLBI R01. The work that Dr. Vikram is building on cuts across divisions as well, with an overlap into gastroenterology. But an interesting aspect of his grant is how it was developed. I have spoken before about our Vice Chair for Research Dr. Chad Grueter’s plans for grant-writing workshops that cut across divisions and ranks. Dr. Vikram, it turns out, is himself a member of Dr. Grueter’s pilot workshop, and this recently funded R01, which will look at how the gut microbiome impacts cardiovascular health, received regular and encouraging feedback from his workshop colleagues. His success is their success is our success. Well done!
Whether we call that informal mentoring or just peer support, the simple fact is greatness will only be achieved when we work together. It should remain an essential component of how we do research in Internal Medicine. And there an infinite number of ways we can support the growth of young researchers until they can pass on what they learn to the next generation. Formal funding structures like the Parker B. Francis Fellowship, recently won by postdoctoral fellow Dr. Wenjie Yu, has worked at least once before just in the last 10 years. The previous winner from our Pulmonary division, Dr. Alejandro Pezzulo, won it in 2017 and now has a thriving research career in another of our areas of strength, lung epithelial biology. Even bringing along researchers-in-training on a project here and there, helping them see the process, gives them a taste. Five of our medicine residents notched publications last month and who knows how many more before they graduate. One of those residents, Dr. Haley Pysick, is even taking advantage of our unique StARR program, with a supported year off from clinical rotations in order to dive more deeply into a mentored research project. Lastly, Jurnie Rosius, an undergraduate student in my laboratory, was just accepted as a Fulbright Fellow for the next academic year. Her project started with a conversation with another researcher in the department and will take her to Munich, Germany, to study the cardiovascular side effect of radiation, another area where we are pulling together with Drs. Barry London, Bryan Allen, Doug Spitz, and others to build an area of strength. The more we connect with each other about what we are working on, the more opportunities and ideas will reveal themselves. Keep talking!
