Health And Medicine

Vanderbilt researchers are working to better design immune therapies that attack tumors without also attacking healthy normal tissue in patients. Read More

Lars Plate, assistant professor of chemistry and biological sciences, has received a $2.76 million collaborative grant to investigate medical therapy for people with cystic fibrosis. The interdisciplinary project brings together teams with varied expertise in computational structural biology, proteomics, biophysics, and physiology in hopes of improving the quality of life for those afflicted with the genetic disease. Read More

Twelve current investigators at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and Vanderbilt University are on this year’s list of scientists whose papers have been cited the most frequently by other researchers. Read More

Vanderbilt research discovers that iron storage “spheres” inside the bacterium C. diff — the leading cause of hospital-acquired infections — are important for infection in an animal model and could offer new targets for antibacterial drugs. Read More

New research shows nearly everyone can lower their blood pressure, even people currently on blood pressure- reducing drugs, by lowering their sodium intake. Read More

A comprehensive study that integrates multiple analytic approaches has linked a regulatory gene network and functional defects in insulin-producing pancreatic beta cells to Type 2 diabetes. Read More

Clinicians need to have a better understanding of the potential impact of patients’ anxiety sensitivity, or “fear of fear,” according to an article published in American Journal of Critical Care. When a patient has anxiety sensitivity, they misinterpret nonthreatening symptoms as threatening, assessing the potential meaning across physical, social or cognitive domains. These “what if” thoughts may trigger a spiral effect, stimulating the nervous system and resulting in stronger sensations and further catastrophic misinterpretations. Read More

Reporting Nov. 6 in Cell Reports Medicine, Ivelin Georgiev, PhD, and colleagues demonstrated that antibodies isolated from children’s blood samples displayed high levels of neutralization and potency against variants of the COVID-19 virus, SARS-CoV-2, even when the children had not previously been exposed to or vaccinated against those variants. Read More

Kimryn Rathmell, MD, PhD, chair of Medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, has received the Paragon Award for Research Excellence from the Doris Duke Foundation. Read More

In the largest study of its kind, researchers at Vanderbilt have identified unexpected alterations in the exocrine tissues of the pancreas that occur in the two major forms of diabetes, and with aging and obesity. Read More

As a professor of biochemistry and medicine at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine for more than 40 years, Osheroff is the longest serving course director currently teaching medical students. He also codirects the preclerkship phase of the medical school curriculum and leads the Master Science Teachers cohort, a role established in 2007 to recognize VUSM’s outstanding basic science educators. Through his teaching, he has helped medical students at VUSM and across the globe acquire the basic science skills and knowledge they need to thrive in clinical practice, according to the AAMC. Read More

Vanderbilt's James E. Crowe, Jr, MD, and Neil Osheroff, PhD, are among 12 individuals honored by the Association of American Medical Colleges during its 2023 Awards Recognition Event. Read More

Vanderbilt research shows that commensal gut microbes impact the host-pathogen competition for iron and have implications for therapeutic strategies aimed at preventing pathogens from acquiring essential nutrients. Read More

For his outstanding achievements, including investigations directed at nucleic acid structure, DNA bypass polymerases and the circadian clock, Martin Egli has been elected to the European Academy of Sciences and Arts. The academy is dedicated to innovative research, interdisciplinary and transnational collaboration.  Read More

Vanderbilt doctor of nursing practice students who hope to become nursing faculty may take advantage of a $1.52 million grant from the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration Bureau of Health Workforce, Nurse Faculty Loan Program. Vanderbilt University School of Nursing received the award to support DNP students through the 2023-2024 academic year. Read More

New research from the Office of Biomedical Research Education and Training connects the dots between career goals during graduate school and career outcomes, articulates how careers of Ph.D. alumni evolve during the 10 years after graduation. Read More

A multidisciplinary team of investigators has received a 2023 Endeavor Award from The Mark Foundation for Cancer Research to support four closely linked projects exploring the fundamental mechanisms that drive the obesity-cancer connection, Read More

A new partnership with AARP Tennessee and the National Museum of African American Music is allowing the Therapeutic Music in the ICU program led by Vanderbilt School of Nursing Professor Ruth Kleinpell and Vanderbilt University Medical Center Professor Joseph Schlesinger to expand, with outreach to veterans and older adults at long-term care facilities in Middle Tennessee. Read More

WATCH: Today’s fight against infectious diseases is being waged in the computer lab as much as the wet lab. Using artificial intelligence and machine learning, Vanderbilt researchers and students like School of Engineering undergraduate Karen Pu are expanding the power of computer modeling to identify mutating viruses—and potentially improve vaccines. Read More