Dr. Derek Allison (first author) and Dr. Julie Dueber (co-author) have an article that was accepted for publication by the journal Seminars in Diagnostic Pathology titled "Molecular findings in thyroid tumors: Practical diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic insights." Link to the article is here: https://www.clinicalkey.com/#!/content/playContent/1-s2.0-S0740257026000304?returnurl=https:%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS0740257026000304%3Fshowall%3Dtrue&referrer= Congratulations to you both!
Dr. Derek Allison is a co-investigator on a newly funded project titled "The Role of SETDB1 in Prostate Cancer." This project is funded by the American Cancer Society and is in collaboration with the department of toxicology and cancer biology and the Markey-McDowell Cancer Network. Dr. Ka Wing Fa is the PI. Great work, Dr. Allison!
Drs. Cody Bumgardner and Justin Miller are co-authors on a recent publication in the journal Translational Psychiatry titled "Behavioral and transcriptomic markers of susceptibility to escalate fentanyl intake." This article was a collaboration with the UK College of Pharmacy, the departments of neuroscience and psychology, and the division of biostatistics. Link to the article is here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41398-026-04034-1.
Dr. Cody Bumgardner and his students and staff have been very busy. See below for details on their activities!
- Articles:
- "DINO-LG: Enhancing vision transformers with label guidance for coronary artery calcium detection" in the journal Medical & Biological Engineering & Computing. Link to the article is here: https://rdcu.be/fe1NW
- "A histopathology aware DINO model with attention-based representation enhancement" in the journal Scientific Reports. Link to the article is here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-025-31438-8
- American Medical Informatics Association Annual Symposium, November 7-11, 2026 in Dallas, TX - accepted papers
- "Logit Fingerprinting: A Novel, Accuracy-Independent Method for Validating Large Language Model Stability in High-Stakes Clinical Applications", authors Vaiden Logan, Mitchell Klusty, Cody Bumgardner
- "Vision Foundry: A System for Training Foundational Vision AI Models", authors Mahmut Gokmen, Mitchell Klusty, Evan Damron, Vaiden Logan, Aaron Mullen, Caroline Leach, Emily Collier, Sam Armstrong, Cody Bumgardner
- "A Secure Sandbox Environment for Orchestrating Medical AI Agents Using Model Context Protocols and Role-Based Access Control", authors Sam Armstrong, Mitchell Klusty, Vaiden Logan, Caroline Leach, Cody Bumgardner
- "A Framework for Cross-Domain Generalization in CAC Scoring Across Gated and Non-Gated CT", authors Mahmut Gokmen, Caroline Leach, Cody Bumgardner
- "Bridging the Clinical Expertise Gap: Development of a Web-Based Platform for Accessible Time Series Forecasting and Analysis", authors Aaron Mullen, Cody Bumgardner
- "Using a Computer Vision Ensemble and Weight Data to Achieve Reliable Syringe Exchange", authors Evan Damron, Sam Armstrong, Cody Bumgardner
- "Leveraging LLMs for Structured Data Extraction from Unstructured Patient Records", authors Mitchell Klusty, Caroline Leach, Vaiden Logan, Emily Collier, Sam Armstrong, Cody Bumgardner
- Association of Pathology Informatics PI Summit, May 18-21, 2026 in Minneapolis, MN - accepted abstracts
- "Benchmarking Adaptation Strategies for Public Pathology Foundation Models: Frozen Features vs. Low-Rank Adaptation", authors Evan Damron, Mahmut Gokmen, Mitchell Klusty, Caroline Leach, Cody Bumgardner
- "Magnification-Aware LeJEPA: Streamlining Self-Supervised Representation Learning for Whole-Slide Images", authors Evan Damron, Mahmut Gokmen, Mitchell Klusty, Caroline Leach, Cody Bumgardner
Dr. Ibrahim Choucair is sole author of a recent publication in the Journal of Chromatography B titled "Chromatography and mass spectrometry in therapeutic drug monitoring: Method performance, practical trade-offs, and implementation considerations." The link to the article is here: https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1moaS_Zihpgk2l. Excellent work, Dr. Choucair!
Monika Ellis has been named the 2026 Kentucky Society for Histotechnology Histotech of the Year!
For all of us who know and work with Monika, we know how well-deserved this award is. Congratulations!
Dr. Ahmad Faraz presented his poster, "A Comparative Overview of Medicolegal Death Investigation in Pakistan and the United States" at the Annual National Association of Medical Examiners Meeting and was featured on the cover of their International Newsletter. Great work, Dr. Faraz!
Dr. Justin Miller has been exceedingly busy this month! See below for all of his good news. Congratulations, Dr. Miller!
- Dr. Miller has been nominated for the department of internal Medicine Chair's Excellence Award for his work in establishing the new PhD program in Bioinformatics and Data Science.
- He and his team (including Dr. Pete Nelson) had two abstracts and a painting accepted for the Alzheimer's Association International Conference (July 12-15 in London, England)
- Abstract 1: "Extreme Polygenic Risk Scores Are Uncommon But Strong Indicators Of Alzheimer’s Disease Risk" Authors: Elizabeth L. Ward, Peter T. Nelson, Yuriko Katsumata, David Fardo, Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, Justin B. Miller.
- Abstract 2: "Optimizing And Benchmarking Polygenic Risk Scores For Alzheimer’s Disease" Authors: Elizabeth L. Ward, Peter T. Nelson, Yuriko Katsumata, David Fardo, Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, Justin B. Miller.
- Abstract 3: Beyond the Data: Art and Reflections: "Forget Me Not" Authors: Elisandra A. Miller and Justin B. Miller.
- Dr. Miller was invited to give three recent presentations at UK events:
- February 16, 2026 - Sanders-Brown Center on Aging Monthly Lecture Series titled "Leveraging Genetics and AI to Improve Alzheimer's Disease Risk Prediction" .
- March 31, 2026 - CCTS Spring Conference titled "Improving Genetics Research with AI: nucleotide Foundation Models Enhance Alzheimer's Disease Risk Prediction".
- April 1, 2026 - UK's Artificial Intelligence Literacy and Training (ALT HUB) Symposium titled "Using new AI-based models to improve Alzheimer's disease genetic risk prediction".
Dr. Justin Rueckert is co-author on a recently published case report in ACG Case Reports Journal titled "Rare Osseous Metaplasia in a Hyperplastic Gastric Polyp". The senior author was Elijah Brazel, a current M3 who was chosen for the CAP Distinguished Medical Student Award. Link to the report is here: https://journals.lww.com/acgcr/fulltext/2026/04000/rare_osseous_metaplasia_in_a_hyperplastic_gastric.40.aspx.
Drs. Justin Rueckert and Trae Thompson are co-authors on a recent letter to the editor in the journal Pediatric Blood & Cancer titled "Catastrophic Brain Hemorrhage in a Teenager With Immune Thrombocytopenia and Polyarteritis Nodosa". This letter was a collaboration with the department of pediatrics and the Markey Cancer Center. Excellent work!
Two of our residents have had abstracts accepted for the University of Kentucky Graduate Medical Education Quality Improvement & Patient Safety Poster Forum! See below for details. Congratulations to all!
- Dr. Ben Cushing, Kathy Evans and Dr. Aaron Shmookler: "No Added Value of Parallel Alloantibody Titer Compared With Serial Titer in Tube"
- Dr. Ahmad Faraz, Kathy Evans and Dr. Aaron Shmookler: "Quality Review of Urinalysis in the Workup of Transfusion Reactions: Diagnostic Utility and Cost Implications"