AUGUST 2026 NEWSLETTER

Improving Stroke Care and Innovation

Every 40 seconds, someone in the U.S. has a stroke, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Investigators at Feinberg are working from multiple angles of the stroke care pathway, leading to research that may improve recovery after a stroke occurs.

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Master’s Program Revamped to Address Informatics Needs

In the landscape of AI, there are huge libraries of data, and Feinberg scientists have recognized the need to develop a workforce with these skills in informatics to analyze large amounts of information for research and other health contexts.

To address this need, the Master of Science in Biomedical Informatics program — previously known as the Master of Science in Health and Biomedical Informatics — will launch in the fall offering two tracks: one in bioinformatics and another in health informatics.

Learn more about the program

Feinberg Names 2026 Mentors of the Year

Feinberg’s Medical Faculty Council honored the recipients of the 2026 Mentor of the Year awards at a workshop on June 11, with awardees sharing their career journeys and insights they have gained from years of mentoring.

This year’s recipients were Hasan Alam, MD, chair of the Department of Surgery and the Loyal and Edith Davis Professor of Surgery, and Rick McGee, PhD, associate dean for professional development and professor of Medical Education.

Learn more about the awardees

Faculty Profile

Using Health Economics to Improve Global Healthcare Systems

Ciaran Kohli-Lynch, PhD, studies cost-effectiveness analysis or how health systems can design sustainable benefit packages based on the objectives of policymakers. He is also assistant director of the Buehler Center for Health Policy and Economics within the Robert J. Havey, MD Institute for Global Health.

Read more about his research

Staff Profile

Leading Lab Management and Scientific Discovery

Lynn Welch is a research laboratory manager for the Department of Pulmonary & Critical Care Medicine at Feinberg. She has managed the laboratory of Jacob Sznajder, MD, the Ernest S. Bazley Professor of Asthma and Related Disorders, for more than two decades.

Read about her work

Student Profile

Studying Host-Pathogen Interactions and the Broader Context of Disease

Grayce Mores is a PhD candidate in the Driskill Graduate Program in Life Sciences. In the laboratory of Alan Hauser, MD, PhD, professor and vice chair of Microbiology-Immunology, she studies host-pathogen interactions and how microbes adapt to the body during infection.

Learn more about her research

Campus Events

Research in the News

Fox Chicago — New blood test makes pancreatic cancer easier to detect with Akhil Chawla, MD

Chicago Sun Times — ‘Shell-shocked’ Chicago scientists raise alarm about federal overhaul of research grant funding with Ravi Kalhan, MD, MS

Fox Chicago — The hidden cost of GLP-1s: Popularity surge raises long-term affordability questions with Xiaoning Huang, PhD

Check out More Media Coverage

NUCATS Corner

Bridging the gap between rehabilitation research and patient care is part of what Michael Ellis, PT, DPT, does as Northwestern Medicine's inaugural director of translational rehabilitation research. In this episode of “Science in Translation,” Ellis discusses the future of rehabilitation research, shares lessons from a groundbreaking stroke recovery clinical trial he is conducting, and explains how collaboration and implementation science can accelerate better outcomes for rehabilitation patients.

Listen to the podcast

Breakthroughs Podcast

What is the Genetic Overlap Between Autism and Schizophrenia?

In this episode, Peter Penzes, PhD, discusses the recent discovery and how this research could one day offer earlier diagnosis, more precise treatment and better outcomes for patients.

Listen to the podcast episode

Galter Library

Ready to Publish? Choosing a Journal for Federally Funded Research

Whether you already have a preferred journal or are deciding where to publish, new federal public access requirements may affect your options. Authors are now faced with the requirement to place their U.S.-funded publications and data in public repositories immediately upon first publication in a journal.

Read about the initiative

Sponsored Research

Defining Determinants of the Lineage Identity Program in Lung Cancer and Therapeutic Resistance

Learn about the project

High Impact Research

Bandaru R, Fu H, Zheng H, Liang J, Wang L, Gulati S, Hinrichs BH, Teng M, Zhang B, Kocherginsky M, Lin DC, Hildeman DA, Worden FP, Old M, Dunlap NE, Kaczmar JM, Gillison ML, El-Gamal D, Wise Draper T, Liu Y. Genome-wide variation in cell-free DNA end-motif entropy predicts immunotherapy response in head and neck cancer. The Journal of Clinical Investigation. Jul 2026; 136(13).

Bhatt SP, Sun Y, Wang Y, Balte PP, Schwartz JE, Cassano P, Chaves PH, Couper D, Jacobs DR, Kalhan R, Kaplan RC, Lloyd-Jones D, Newman AB, O'Connor GT, Sadatsafavi M, Umans JG, White WB, Yende S, Oelsner EC. Life Expectancy in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. JAMA Internal Medicine. Jul 2026; 186(7):852-860.

Brijnath B, Welch V, Habibzadeh F, Dawson S, Li T, Richards DP, Chinembiri O, Ghersi D, Orkin AM, Cameron KA, Coase D, Golub RM, Heuschkel M, Jasicki L, Leigh L, Benn R, Papadopoulos G, Siegfried N, Straiton N, Treweek S, Chan AW, Green H, Owusu-Addo E, Feldman P, Muoio R. Measurement of ethnicity in clinical trials: Delphi survey and consensus statement. Bmj (clinical Research Ed.). Jul 2026; 394:e409503. 

Chakrabarty RP, Van Vranken JG, Aoi Y, Poor TA, McElroy GS, Vasan K, Soliman SHA, Iwanaszko M, Grant RA, Howard BC, Reczek CR, Chandel AD, Kahl M, Xu Z, Helmin KA, Jin Q, Wang D, Gao P, Blum JLE, Sebo ZL, Yue F, Ma YC, Davidson SM, Gygi SP, Weinberg SE, Singer BD, Han S, Shilatifard A, Chandel NS. Mitochondrial L-2-hydroxyglutarate is a physiological signalling metabolite. Nature. Jul 2026; 655(8124):1037-1047. 

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Featured Core

Biosafety Level 3 Laboratory

The Northwestern University BSL-3 Core Lab Facility is a newly commissioned biocontainment level three (BSL-3) facility constructed and designed to support research, both in vitro and in vivo, with infectious agents requiring a higher level of biosafety containment. The facility helps researchers further the understanding and development of vaccines, diagnostics and treatments for potentially life-threatening infectious diseases. 

The facility also provides access to space and equipment configured for high containment experimentation, hands-on training, protocol development and consultation in a shared workspace. 

NIH Notices

• NIH Is Replacing Letters of Support with Letters of Collaboration to Reduce Administrative Burden
  (NOT-OD-26-094)
  National Institutes of Health
  
  
• Implementation Update: NIH Data Management and Sharing Plan Requirements
  (NOT-OD-26-100)
  National Institutes of Health
  
  
• NIH Webinar: You're Invited: A Conversation on NIH's Unified Funding Strategy
  (NOT-OD-26-099)
  National Institutes of Health
  
  
• USG Policy for Stopping High-Risk Life Sciences Research
  (NOT-OD-26-101)
  National Institutes of Health
  
  
• Notice of Information: Changes to NIGMS Institutional Basic Biomedical and Clinician Scientist Training Programs
  (NOT-GM-26-007)
  National Institute of General Medical Sciences

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