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Wednesday, the DREAM Council announced the 2024 recipients of the Walter B. Frommeyer Jr. Fellowship in Investigative Medicine Award and the PhD Career Development Award for Research at the annual Trainee Research Symposium keynote panel discussion. Each award was designed to promote mentored research and foster the development of outstanding junior and senior scientist. Congratulations to these incredible scientists.

This week, the Department of Medicine hosted its annual reception to celebrate the 2023 DOM STAR for Staff Excellence awardees. Recipients were joined by leadership, coworkers, and family in the Wallace Tumor Institute lobby. Leaders shared remarks about the unique value each recipient adds to the department, highlighting exceptional patient care, advancing research, collaboration and culture building, and organization and planning. Thank you to the 2023 DOM STAR awardees for shining so brightly in our department.

Within six months, Sarah Hazen went from being a vibrant and energetic 85-year-old, to experiencing shortness of breath, difficulty bending over, and an inability to walk more than twenty feet without resting. Hazen consulted with a team of UAB cardiologists and was diagnosed with aortic insufficiency and stenosis — conditions that cause the heart to enlarge and weaken, affecting its ability to pump blood to the rest of the body.

Wednesday, over two hundred Department of Medicine employees joined to watch Department Chair Seth Landefeld, M.D., and our 11 division directors for the annual State of the Department Address. Landefeld kicked off the presentation by thanking all our staff, faculty, trainees, and practitioners for their dedication to the department. He detailed our 2023 accomplishments, emphasizing the advancement of wellness, new innovations in research, and the continued success of educational programs. Division directors added highlights from their divisions in mentorship, clinical care, training and more. If you missed the session, you can watch the recorded presentation and view the slides online.

Veena Antony, M.D., (Professor, PACCM) led a study published in Scientific Reports, detailing the effect of low dose cadmium — a highly toxic metal and environmental pollutant found in cigarette smoke — on lung epithelial cells. Investigators focused on the interaction of microRNA-381 and AN01 in lung epithelial cells by comparing lung tissue samples from participants who never smoked and individuals with COPD who previously smoked a minimum of 15 pack years. Participants with a smoke history presented increased AN01 expression in their airway epithelial cells, which could exacerbate COPD.