The Keck School of Medicine of USC, The Lawrence J. Ellison Institute for Transformative Medicine of USC, and the USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center have been proud partners in the Cancer Moonshot Initiative and its vision to double the rate … Read More »
By Jon Nalick
Owen Bennett-Jones, freelance British journalist and a host of “Newshour” on the BBC World Service, captivated audiences in Mayer Auditorium as he told tales of how local culture can shape — or sabotage — efforts to improve education and health worldwide.
He described how a leader in northwest Afghanistan shunned offers to build for free a school in his region, saying simply, “I don’t want it.” Later, while hunting with a would-be benefactor, the leader shot ducks that fell into a lake. He whistled and several men jumped into the water to retrieve them. The leader mused, “Do you honestly think they’d do that if they went to school?”
“And that is what you’re up against,” said Bennett-Jones: “Local elites who are quite determined to keep their people uneducated so they can hold on to the power that they’ve got.” … Read More »
By Ryan Ball
Nancy Warner
Photo/Ryan Ball
Picking at her smoked salmon with chopsticks at the faculty center named for Hugh A. Edmondson, MD, who preceded her as chair of the Department of Pathology at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, Nancy Warner, MD, Hastings Professor of Pathology, emerita, reflects on her legacy at the school.
At the age of 90, Warner remains a formidable presence, one that has been felt on the Health Sciences Campus since she became the school’s first female department chair in 1972. In fact, she was the first woman in the United States to be named chair of a pathology department at a coeducational school of medicine. … Read More »
By Ryan Ball
When the ARCS (Achievement Rewards for College Scientists) Foundation Inc. was established in 1958 to provide financial awards to U.S. graduate and undergraduate students for innovative pursuits in science, engineering and medical research, the Soviet Union had just launched Sputnik and the United States feared it might fall behind on the technology front.
Although the Cold War space race has long since cooled, the foundation continues to foster emerging talent — including Keck School of Medicine of USC postdoctoral research fellow Rachel Service, PhD, the first recipient of a $10,000 postdoctoral fellowship awarded by ARCS and The John Douglas French Alzheimer’s Foundation.
Service is exploring multiple areas of structural biology, and she believes that understanding the structure of and functional relationship between proteins is key to developing new therapies, studying disease processes and advancing clean energy, among other pursuits. … Read More »
By Alison Trinidad
Patients who suffer from uncontrolled epilepsy now have new treatment options at Keck Medicine of USC, thanks to the recent founding of the USC Center for Neurorestoration.
The center proposes to physically test innovative neural engineering and basic neuroscience to restore neurological circuitry and function within the human brain.
Christianne Heck, MD, MMM, associate professor of neurology at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, medical director of the USC Comprehensive Epilepsy Program, and Charles Liu, MD, PhD, professor of neurosurgery and neurology at the Keck School, surgical director of the USC Comprehensive Epilepsy Program, are co-directors of the new center. Heck and Liu worked extensively over the last three years to build USC’s Level 4 epilepsy program. … Read More »
By Alison Trinidad
Exposure to air pollution appears to increase the risk for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) among people who carry a genetic disposition for the disorder, according to newly published research led by scientists at the Keck School of Medicine of USC.
“Our research shows that children with both the risk genotype and exposure to high air pollutant levels were at increased risk of autism spectrum disorder compared to those without the risk genotype and lower air pollution exposure,” said the study’s first author, Heather E. Volk, PhD, MPH, assistant professor of research in preventive medicine and pediatrics at the Keck School and principal investigator at The Saban Research Institute of Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. … Read More »
By Amy E. Hamaker
The strength of a university can often be measured by the commitment of its alumni. Nowhere is that more apparent than at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, where alumnus Tony Alamo (’91), MD, recently helped bring a gift of $1 million to the school from a family friend.
At a lunch between Alamo, Keck School Dean Carmen A. Puliafito, MD, MBA, and Mike Ensign, retired chairman of the board of directors/CEO of Mandalay Resort Group, Alamo suggested a gift to benefit physicians, Keck Hospital of USC and Keck School students. … Read More »
By Shelby Roberts
Alzheimer’s disease is the No. 6 cause of death in the United States, and stroke is the No. 4 cause.
Helena Chui, MD, chair, Department of Neurology, Raymond and Betty McCarron Chair in Neurology, and professor of neurology and gerontology at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, recently gave a presentation on Alzheimer’s disease and its relation to stroke on Nov. 6 as the sixth lecture in an ongoing Stroke Seminar Series at the Rio Hando Community Center in Downey, Calif. The event was hosted by the Roxanna Todd Hodges Stroke Foundation. … Read More »
By Robert Perkins
Several key faculty members from USC presented the latest pioneering research in neuroscience at the Society for Neuroscience’s annual meeting in San Diego in November.
More than 30,000 scientists and collaborators from 80 countries gathered for presentations by luminaries in the field, including USC’s Antonio Damasio, MD, PhD, Berislav Zlokovic, MD, PhD, and Dan Campbell, PhD. … Read More »
Students, faculty and staff on the Health Sciences Campus were treated to German music and a feast of bratwurst, sauerkraut, German potato salad, beer and pretzels to celebrate the coming of October — and the USC Good Neighbors Campaign. … Read More »
By Cristy Lytal
How do humans and other mammals get so brainy? USC researcher Wange Lu, PhD, and his colleagues shed new light on this question in a paper published in Cell Reports on Oct. 24.
The researchers donned their thinking caps to explain how neural stem and progenitor cells differentiate into neurons and related cells called glia. Neurons transmit information through electrical and chemical signals; glia surround, support and protect neurons in the brain and throughout the nervous system. Glia do everything from holding neurons in place to supplying them with nutrients and oxygen, to protecting them from pathogens.
By studying early mouse embryo neural stem cells in a petri dish, Lu and his colleagues discovered that a protein called SMEK1 promotes the differentiation of neural stem and progenitor cells. At the same time, SMEK1 keeps these cells in check by suppressing their uncontrolled proliferation. … Read More »
By Amy E. Hamaker
The Keck School of Medicine of USC Faculty Council met in a Town Hall meeting on Oct. 15 at the Edmondson Faculty Center on the Health Sciences Campus to discuss medical recruitment, trends and financing in graduate medical education, research trends at the Keck School and faculty recruitment. … Read More »
In recognition of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, six Keck Medicine of USC breast cancer health-care professionals and six breast cancer survivors made an on-field appearance during halftime at the Oct. 26 USC Trojan football game vs. Utah State. … Read More »
By Robert Perkins
Four scientists from the Keck School of Medicine of USC have been elected fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), selected for the honor by their academic peers.
AAAS, the world’s largest general scientific society and the publisher of the journal Science, began the tradition of selecting fellows in 1874. The nonprofit organization has been around since 1848. … Read More »
Art is supporting science thanks to DreamWorks Animation. Once per month for the next year, DreamWorks artists are donating original works for auction on eBay in support of Call to Cure, an organization supporting colorectal cancer research at USC. … Read More »
By Leslie Ridgeway
Using three-dimensional organ creation, Keck Medicine of USC researchers aim to discover clues to metastatic cancer growth by developing a first-ever integrated bioengineered/computational model of metastatic colon cancer.
David B. Agus, MD, director of the USC Center for Applied Molecular Medicine and professor of medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, is the principal investigator of a $2.3 million, four-year “Provocative Questions” grant awarded recently by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), a division of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The project title is “An Integrative Computational and Bioengineered Tissue Model of Metastasis.” … Read More »
By Sara Reeve
For Mikel Snow, PhD, it’s an honor just to be nominated. The chair of the Keck School of Medicine of USC’s Department of Cell & Neurobiology has received the 2013 Alpha Omega Alpha (AOA) Robert J. Glaser Distinguished Teacher Award from the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC).
“I feel incredibly honored, even humbled by the magnitude of this award,” said Snow. “To be honest, I was deeply touched by the gesture of last year’s USC AOA [chapter] students who told me they would be nominating me. I do not think of myself in terms of anyone special, but rather someone who was fortunate to stumble into a teaching career that I happened to enjoy very much.” … Read More »
By Amy E. Hamaker
Have you ever felt driven to eat something sweet, even when you didn’t want to? The reason for this drive may be the high levels of sugar, fat and salt in food, which produce a dopamine hit that alters brain chemistry, according to David Kessler, MD, professor of pediatrics and epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine.
Kessler’s comments came during his lecture on Nov. 12 as part of the Dean’s Distinguished Lecture Series, held in Mayer Auditorium. His focus was from his book, The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite. … Read More »
Zlokovic named holder of newly endowed chair; brings total Zilkha giving to $30M
By Alison Trinidad
Los Angeles residents Selim Zilkha and Mary Hayley are raising the stakes in the fight against Alzheimer’s disease, the only cause of death among the top 10 in the United States that cannot currently be prevented, cured or slowed.
Zilkha, a member of the Keck School of Medicine of USC Board of Overseers, has pledged a gift of $5 million to the school to fund a new endowed chair in Alzheimer’s disease research. This latest gift brings Zilkha’s total giving to neuroscience research at the Keck School to more than $30 million. … Read More »
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