Features

Bringing Science to Tribal Community

Tribal Leaders Discuss Research Priorities, Glimpse Into Intramural Life

At NIH’s annual Tribal Advisory Committee (TAC) meeting, elected Tribal officials exchanged views, gathered information, and advised how NIH programs could best address the health challenges facing their respective nations. The TAC agenda typically includes panel presentations by American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) researchers, a Tribal caucus, and discussions with NIH leadership. This year, the delegates were also invited to tour intramural labs at NIH’s Clinical Center.

Bryan Roth, Natural Products, and the John Daly Legacy

On a tropically warm afternoon on September 6, Bryan Roth, the Michael Hooker Distinguished Professor of Protein Therapeutics and Translational Biometrics at the University of North Carolina (UNC) School of Medicine in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, delivered the 2023 John Daly Lecture, titled “Natural Products Reveal Receptors for Perception” at the Lipsett Auditorium. The late John Daly, of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, was at times an “Indiana Jones” kind of scientist who periodically traveled deep into the Amazon to discover and characterize structurally and biologically new natural products (NPs), such as batrachotoxin, the toxic substance in frog skin used for poison arrows there.

Sidransky and Singleton Win the Prestigious Breakthrough Prize

NIHers Ellen Sidransky and Andrew Singleton have won the 2024 Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences for their impactful scientific discoveries of the most common genetic causes of Parkinson's disease. They share this prestigious recognition with Thomas Gasser of the Hertie Institute for Clinical Brain Research in Tuebingen, Germany.

Building a Central Nexus of Computational Biologists Across NIH

NLM’s New Scientific Director: Richard Scheuermann, Ph.D.

The National Library of Medicine (NLM) welcomed Richard Scheuermann as its new Scientific Director in September. Scheuermann is a leader in informatics, data science, and computational methods with a breadth of experience in molecular immunology and infectious diseases.

Catherine Gordon Named New NICHD Clinical Director

Pediatric Endocrinologist Returns to NIH to Lead Clinical Research

An aspiring medical student some 40 years ago, Gordon worked at the National Library of Medicine and volunteered on the CC’s pediatric oncology ward that summer. Her path has come full circle; she steps into the role of Clinical Director (CD) of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) this September.

Bright, Fresh Ideas

Snapshots from Early-career Investigators

A new cohort of early-career investigators from across the NIH set an enlivening tone for this year’s NIH Research Festival with a series of lectures on September 18 and 19 in the Lipsett Amphitheater in Building 10 describing their innovative and collaborative research.

Hunting Down Good Science

Discovery on Display at the NIH Research Festival Poster Sessions

The air was astir with the rumbling of fresh findings emanating from the postpandemic return of the NIH Research Festival on Monday, September 18. Over the next two days, nearly 400 posters capturing the breadth of NIH intramural research lined the Clinical Center FAES terrace, with an additional 40 showcased in a Wednesday virtual-only session.

Dale Sandler on Risk Factors for Breast Cancer

“Sister Study” Cohort Reveals the Power of Population-Level Research

Dale Sandler, a Senior Investigator at the National Institute of Environmental Health Science (NIEHS), and colleagues developed a large-scale prospective study to identify environmental risk factors for breast cancer. As this year’s chosen presenter of the G. Burroughs Mider Lecture, on September 20, she presented an overview of this famed "Sister Study," which she has led for 20 years.

Chemists of the NIH, Unite!

The NIH Catalyst is commemorating 30 years of publishing with a series of updates to past coverage. In this issue, we highlight the exceptional contributions of NIH chemists in their pursuit of identifying molecular structures, synthesizing, isolating or formulating molecules of interest, or otherwise providing the backbone on which so much of NIH biomedical research is based.

A Bedside-to-Bench-to-Bedside NIH Success Story

NIAID Research Leads to FDA-Approved Drug for Rare Disease

When Micael arrived at the NIH Clinical Center three years ago from rural Bolivia, the 15-year-old was suffering from debilitating symptoms that included severe gastrointestinal pain, nausea, vomiting, and lung infections. He was one of fewer than 100 people worldwide looking for answers for CHAPLE disease, which stands for “complement hyperactivation, angiopathic thrombosis, and protein-losing enteropathy.” Fortunately, researchers at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) had already been investigating how to help.

NIDCR Summer Poster Day Highlights Students Working, Learning in Labs

Each summer, the NIH hosts hundreds of college students as summer research interns. NIDCR welcomed 22 such interns, who each conducted full-time research in the laboratory of an NIDCR intramural investigator. The students also attended networking events, a graduate and professional school fair, a scientific lecture series, and a research day held in collaboration with the University of Maryland School of Dentistry (Baltimore).