For tens of millions of patients who battle chronic lung diseases, present-day care options are mostly limited to short-term drug and oxygen therapy. McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine affiliated faculty member and Carnegie Mellon University’s (CMU’s) Biomedical Engineering’s Interim Department Head and Professor Keith Cook, PhD, is working on innovative technologies to advance the long-term effectiveness and future use of artificial organs to address this worldwide issue.
In recent decades, computer mice have become just as ubiquitous as computers. Now, thanks to Human Engineering Research Laboratories (HERL) and VA researchers, there’s even a prosthetic hook mouse for people with upper-limb amputations.
The third Saturday in May marks National Armed Forces Day. Here are some In the News articles which detail the ways in which the research of McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine affiliated faculty members supports members of the military community:
Elderly residents of long-term care facilities mount a detectable antibody response to COVID-19 vaccination, according to a recently conducted survey of UPMC Senior Community residents. Because it’s not yet known how long the antibodies persist, the authors’ urged continual monitoring for COVID-19 symptoms and cautioned that there’s still a need for controlled reopening of the facilities.
Oncologists faced with treating older women with breast cancer often must decide if the treatment may be more detrimental than the cancer. A study published in JAMA Network Open by researchers at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine sheds new light on this choice and suggests the rate of cancer recurrence or survival may be no different in treated vs. untreated elderly patients diagnosed in the early stages of the cancer diagnosed most commonly in women. McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine affiliated faculty member Steffi Oesterreich, PhD, the Shear Family Foundation Chair in Breast Cancer Research Professor and Vice-Chair Department of Pharmacology and Chemical Biology, University of Pittsburgh; Co-Leader Cancer Biology Program, UPMC Hillman Cancer Center (UPMC HCC); and Co-Director Women’s Cancer Research Center, UPMC HCC and Magee Womens Research Institute, is a co-author on the study.
The first large-scale, multi-hospital evaluation of an “all or none” federal policy intended to improve outcomes in sepsis patients finds that the guidelines are a wash—on average they neither helped nor hurt despite significant investments in their implementation, according to an analysis by University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine (UPMC) clinician-scientists of nearly a dozen hospitals in one academic health system. McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine affiliated faculty member Derek Angus, MD, MPH, Executive Vice President, and Chief Healthcare Innovation Officer, UPMC; Associate Vice Chancellor for Healthcare Innovation, University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences; Distinguished Professor and Mitchell P. Fink Endowed Chair, Department of Critical Care Medicine, University of Pittsburgh and UPMC; Senior editor, JAMA, is a co-author on the study.
CATER Trainee Laura Molina defended her dissertation, “YAP1 Signaling in Hepatobiliary Development and Oncogenesis,” on May 12, 2021. We all wish Laura a hearty congratulations on doing such a fabulous job!
People with cancer that affects the blood, bone marrow or lymph nodes are at elevated risk of COVID-19 vaccine failure, particularly those with chronic lymphocytic leukemia, according to new results from an analysis of UPMC Hillman Cancer Center patients. McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine faculty member Alan Wells, MD, DMSc, medical director of UPMC Clinical Laboratories and the Thomas Gill III Professor of Pathology in Pitt’s School of Medicine, is a co-author of these results.
University of Pittsburgh bioengineer Partha Roy, PhD, Associate Professor of Bioengineering, Cell Biology, and Pathology at the University of Pittsburgh, received awards from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) of the National Institute of Health and the Magee Women’s Cancer Research and Education Funding Committee to investigate the role of actin-binding protein profilin1 in metastatic breast cancer — the second most common cancer among women in the United States. In 2021, an estimated 281,550 new cases of invasive breast cancer will be diagnosed in U.S. women, and around 15 percent of those cases are expected to be fatal.
University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University graduate students have been selected for the 2021 National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP), which recognizes outstanding graduate students who are pursuing full-time research-based master’s and doctoral degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Five of these selected students are advised by McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine affiliated faculty members:
