The HMS Office for Diversity and Community Partnership (DCP) and the Harvard Catalyst Program for Faculty Development and Diversity (PFDD) have each named recipients of new fellowships designed to support junior faculty. This is the first year that either of the fellowships has been offered.
“Support is critical for junior faculty, particularly underrepresented minority faculty early in their careers and at a time when federal funding is hard to come by,” said Joan Reede, dean for diversity and community partnership. “We are pleased to offer these resources, which allow these talented young scientists to thrive and reach their full potential and which support increased diversity in the upper echelons of the HMS faculty.”
The DCP faculty fellowships provide $50,000 a year of support for two years so the recipients can conduct a mentored research project, participate in fellowship-related activities, and meet regularly with mentors. These activities are intended to promote the recipients’ professional development as researchers, clinicians, and teachers, leading to their advancement in the HMS faculty ranks.
Recipients of the inaugural DCP fellowships are Lenny Lopez, HMS instructor in medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and an assistant in health policy at Massachusetts General Hospital, and Arturo Saavedra, HMS instructor in dermatology at BWH.
Lopez, a hospitalist, will work on a project titled “Limited English Proficiency and the Risk for Adverse Events in Hospitalized Patients.” He is exploring whether patient–provider language barriers contribute to adverse events in the hospital.
Saavedra’s project is titled “Understanding the Immunologic Mechanisms that Lead to the Development and Progression of Adverse Cutaneous Drug Eruptions.” He will work toward understanding why HIV patients are at increased risk for cutaneous drug eruptions, an adverse reaction to a drug that, in addition to affecting the skin, can lead to inflammation in other organs and systems or patient death.
The Harvard Catalyst PFDD faculty fellowships are designed to support junior faculty conducting clinical or translational research at a key point in their career, when clinical or teaching duties might otherwise allow little time for career development. Each fellow receives $100,000 over a two-year period. Fellows are expected to devote time to career development and meet regularly with their mentors.
The recipients of the first Harvard Catalyst fellowships are Carlos Estrada, HMS instructor in surgery at Children’s Hospital Boston; Camilia Martin, HMS instructor in pediatrics at CHB; and Lucia Sobrin, HMS instructor in ophthalmology at Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary.
Estrada’s project is titled “Novel Bladder Tissue Engineering: Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell–derived Smooth Muscle Cells and Uroepithelial Cells and Silk Biomaterial Scaffolds.” He is studying the use of silk-based biomaterials in combination with induced pluripotent stem cell–derived bladder cells as sources for tissue engineering of the urinary bladder.
Martin’s project is titled “Fat Malabsorption, Bacterial Colonization, and Intestinal Injury in the Preterm Infant.” Martin, who is also associate director of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, is seeking to identify the environmental and nutritional factors that influence bacterial colonization, which may lead to the development of a particular inflammatory bowel disease in preterm infants, and to characterize the mechanisms by which bacterial colonization affects intestinal inflammation.
Sobrin’s project is titled “The Epidemiology and Genetics of Diabetic Retinopathy in the Jackson Heart Study.” Sobrin will mine data from the Jackson Heart Study to investigate genetic and environmental links to diabetic retinopathy in African Americans with diabetes and impaired fasting glucose.
All fellows will participate in the poster session at the annual Minority Health Policy meeting in May and will present their findings at the 2010 meeting.
