University of Kentucky researchers Robin Vanderpool and Mark Dignan are leading projects funded by the National Cancer Institute’s Center to Reduce Cancer Health Disparities to continue Markey Cancer Center’s community-based efforts aimed at reducing cancer rates in Appalachia. Both programs are funded for three years. Appalachian regions, particularly in Eastern Kentucky, have disproportionately high rates of both incidence and mortality due to cancer when compared to other regions in the United States.
Jin Chen, Ph.D., will join the Division of Biomedical Informatics on July 1st, 2016. During his research career, Dr. Chen focuses on developing data mining and computer vision algorithms to address basic biological problems including phenotype data analysis, phenotype-genotype association, gene regulatory module identification, and data-driven ontology construction. Previously, Dr. Chen was Assistant Professor at Michigan State University and Postdoc Research Associate at Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford University. Dr. Chen received his Ph.D.

One of the leading advocates for technological innovations in cardiothoracic surgery was a special guest speaker with the University of Kentucky Department of Surgery last week.

Dr. W. Randolph Chitwood, founder and director of the East Carolina Heart Institute (ECHI), was featured speaker for the weekly surgical grand rounds on Wednesday, April 6. His presentation, “Innovative Technology in Cardiac Surgery: The times they are a’changing” was an overview of next generation technology in the world of cardiac surgery.

Nearly 68,000 Kentuckians today are suffering from Alzheimer's disease, but the emotional and financial tolls are much higher. That's because, in the words of Linda Van Eldik, Alzheimer's is a "family disease."

"Alzheimer's affects the patient, of course, but as the disease progresses, it is also devastating for the people who love and care for that patient," said Van Eldik, director of the University of Kentucky Sanders-Brown Center on Aging.

Two researchers from the University of Kentucky Sanders-Brown Center on Aging won awards at the National Charleston Conference on Alzheimer's Disease (CCAD) earlier this month. Ai-Ling Lin, Ph.D., and Jose Abisambra, Ph.D., were two of 15 researchers selected from high-caliber institutions such as Harvard, Mount Sinai and New York University to attend the conference based on the quality and originality of their research. Of the four awards presented, Sanders-Brown researchers were awarded two. Lin was one of three recipients who received the $50,000 New Vision Award.

Beginning Monday, April 11th, all new protocol submissions, modifications, adverse events, violations and continuation reviews may be submitted electronically.  This is an initial step in the shift from paper to electronic submission as the web-based E-IRB program is being developed. 

The University of Kentucky Center of Excellence in Rural Health (CERH) Student Services Office held an Academic Advising Summit on March 4 in Hazard. The summit was attended by advisors, administrators, and counselors from several Kentucky Community and Technical College System campuses and the University Center of the Mountains.

Rural Appalachian communities in eastern Kentucky suffer from some of the Nation’s most concerning health disparities.  Community-based research can be an effective way to address health disparities by identifying problems and sharing workable solutions.

With the assistance of the UKHC Business Partners, we are pleased to make available a college-level version of the monthly PI Report.  Using the versions of the report that the SRAS receives by CGO and IBU, this is a college-wide report that can be easily filtered by department.  We have posted the report using February data to the College’s Finance SharePoint site (accessible to chairs and DAs; in the Grants Reports folder, see SPA PI Reports folder) and also to the shared IBU FI drive (in the ! WBS Elements folder, see !