Congratulations to Ona Faye-Petersen, M.D., on earning emeritus status as professor, Anatomic Pathology.
Faye-Petersen began as a full-time practicing pediatric pathologist in 1987 and has been an asset to UAB's Department of Pathology since then. She retired from teaching in the spring of 2019, but continues to keep clinical hours, at UAB Hospital.
Congratulations to William Grizzle, M.D., Ph.D., on earning emeritus status as professor, Anatomic Pathology.
Dr. Grizzle was named professor emeritus of pathology in the School of Medicine. Grizzle joined the UAB faculty in 1981 and retired in January 2020 as professor of pathology and surgery. He directed the Tissue Collection and Banking Facility from 1983 to 2019, including the Southern Division of the Cooperative Human Tissue Network from 1987 to 2019, and led the UAB-VA Autopsy Service from 1990-2000, among other leadership positions. His research focused on understanding the molecular features of epithelial cancers such as prostate, pancreas, mammary, colorectal and ovarian adenocarcinomas and oral, esophageal, lung, cervical and skin squamous cell lesions to identify biomarkers associated either with early pre-invasive neoplastic lesions or with advanced stage malignant lesions.
The Department of Pathology’s Selvarangan Ponnazhagan, Ph.D., Professor, Molecular and Cellular Pathology, has been named Co-Director of P3, a graduate program theme known as Pathobiology, Pharmacology, and Physiology. This is one of the eight themes of the UAB Graduate Biomedical Sciences (GBS) Doctoral Training Program. Ponnazhagan will serve alongside Robert C. van Waardenburg, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology.
John C. Chatham, Ph.D., Professor, and Adam R. Wende, Ph.D., Associate Professor, in the Division of Molecular and Cellular Pathology, have been awarded a two-year, R21 grant from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) to study the role of protein O-linked N-Acetylglucosamine in regulating cardiac physiology.
All proteins are modified in different ways and alter cell function. The most common modification is phosphorylation. The modification the team studies, O-linked N-Acetylglucosamine – O-GlcNAc for short – is a little different in that it is based on the metabolism of glucose. It was identified in the mid-1980s but research on it has been slow to evolve.
The team responded to a program announcement from NHLBI that focused on studying the normal or healthy functioning of human cells and organs critical to the heart and lung, and studies that may reveal the basis of resilience. “The opportunity was high-risk and high-reward,” Chatham says.
Dr. John Chatham, Professor, Molecular and Cellular Pathology
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