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University of Washington School of Medicine
Online News
Vol. 11, No. 15
April 13, 2007
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To view an archived version of Online News on the UW
Medicine Web site, visit:
http://www.uwmedicine.org/Global/NewsAndEvents/somnews/index.htm
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This week’s news:
* Duke professor Debra Schwinn, leading physician scientist in medical genomics, molecular pharmacology, and cardiac anesthesia, to lead UW Department of Anesthesiology
* Rhesus macaque genome may hold clues to human health
* Thomas Robey, M.D./Ph.D. student in bioengineering and pathology, and co-founder of the UW Forum on Science, Ethics and Policy, receives Graduate School Medal
* Computer-aided detection reduces the accuracy of mammograms, according to study conducted at UW and other institutions
* Ceremony on April 30 will honor the late Robert Petersdorf, pioneering administrator at UW School of Medicine and longtime leader in field of academic medicine
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DEBRA SCHWINN TO LEAD UW DEPARTMENT OF ANESTHESIOLOGY
Debra Schwinn, a leading physician scientist in medical genomics, molecular pharmacology, and cardiac anesthesia, has been named the new chair of the UW Department of Anesthesiology, effective May 1. Schwinn has previously served on the faculty of Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C.
Schwinn is currently the James B. Duke Professor of Anesthesiology at Duke, and holds joint appointments as professor of pharmacology/cancer biology, medicine (cardiology), and surgery. She has directed a large molecular pharmacology laboratory, helped establish the Duke Perioperative Genomics group, and is currently program director for cardiovascular genomics in the Center for Genomic Medicine, a part of Duke’s Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy. She is a practicing cardiothoracic anesthesiologist, as well as a scientist and leader of research projects.
Schwinn is especially interested in bringing together physician scientists in fields that are strengths for the UW. One such project, in the area known as perioperative genomics, could bring together genomics researchers and vascular specialists to study how a patient’s genetic makeup could affect their inflammatory response to heart surgery. Schwinn has led similar studies at Duke and plans to continue that work at the UW.
She also hopes to bring together researchers from other disciplines to form teams to work on translational research, which takes lab results and brings them to the bedside or clinic, and vice-versa. The UW offers a good environment for training clinicians to become physician scientists, Schwinn said, and she is committed to maintaining a vibrant research community for studying fundamental mechanisms in a variety of fields.
Schwinn completed her undergraduate education at the College of Wooster, in Ohio, and then earned her medical degree at Stanford University School of Medicine in California. She completed her internal medicine internship and an anesthesiology fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. Schwinn has also completed a clinical fellowship in cardiac anesthesiology and a research fellowship in pharmacology at Duke, as well as training in functional genomics/genetics at the National Human Genome Research Institute in Bethesda, Md.
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RHESUS MACAQUE GENOME MAY HOLD CLUES TO HUMAN HEALTH
An international consortium of scientists has completed a draft sequence of the genome of the rhesus macaque, a species of non-human primate that is widely used for creating models of human diseases and infections. The study could allow researchers to watch disease progression at the genetic level in macaques, a close relative of humans. The findings, which appear in the April 13 issue of Science, will also teach us more about how humans and other primates evolved into distinct species.
Several years ago, UW microbiologist Michael Katze and his colleague, Jeffrey Rogers, a researcher at the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research in San Antonio, Texas, paved the way for this project when they publicly called for the sequencing project and hosted a research symposium in Seattle to discuss how to improve the understanding of macaque biology. Unlocking the rhesus macaque genome, they argued, would give researchers more powerful tools in understanding the processes of disease and infection in an animal model that is much more closely related to humans than other disease-model organisms, like mice.
Katze, who assisted in the sequencing project, is a UW professor of microbiology and researcher in the Washington National Primate Research Center's Functional Genomics and Infectious Disease division. The genome sequence will allow researchers to analyze in a genetic microarray what is going on at the genetic level in tissue affected by disease. That sort of work has not been possible before in non-human primates.
Evan Eichler, UW associate professor of genome sciences, was also involved in the sequence analysis effort. Eichler and his colleagues looked at the large-scale structural organization of the macaque genome, and how that structure differs from that of humans and other primates. They found that compared to humans and chimpanzees, macaques seem to have fewer so-called genome segmental duplications, where a particular chunk of genetic code is repeated over and over again for a large section of the genome.
They also found that the pattern of macaque segmental duplications differed significantly from that of the human genome, and that many of these regions contained genes related to immune system response. Researchers will need to focus on those areas of segmental duplications to resolve them to a higher standard of quality, Eichler said, and learn how those duplications may translate into functional differences in the macaque immune system.
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THOMAS ROBEY RECEIVES GRADUATE STUDENT MEDAL
Thomas Robey, an M.D./Ph.D. student in the UW Medical Scientist Training Program, has received the UW Graduate School Medal. The medal is the highest award given to a graduate student, and recognizes "scholar-citizens" who have an exemplary commitment to both the university and its larger community, a high level of active civic engagement, and a capacity to promote change in society.
Robey, a graduate student in bioengineering and pathology, works in the lab of Charles Murry, professor of pathology and director of the Center for Cardiovascular Biology and Regenerative Medicine. His research area is cell death and fibrosis in cardiac cell transplantation.
Robey is a founding member of the Forum on Science, Ethics and Policy (FOSEP), a UW-based student group aimed at building dialogue between scientists, policymakers, and the public. The group has worked to educate the public on scientific topics and their intersection with ethical and public policy issues, as well as train graduate students about the impact of ethics and policy on scientific research. FOSEP has hosted several high-profile events on campus since its founding three years ago, including public forums on embryonic stem-cell research and intelligent design.
For more information about FOSEP, visit its Web site at:
http://www.fosep.org/
To read the Graduate School announcement about the award and to read Robey's personal statement, visit:
http://www.grad.washington.edu/awards/medal/winners/robey.htm
Robey may be reached at trobey@u.washington.edu
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COMPUTER-AIDED DETECTION MAY MAKE MAMMOGRAMS LESS ACCURATE
Computer-aided detection (CAD) that uses computer software designed to improve how radiologists interpret mammograms may actually make readings less accurate, according to new research published in the April 5 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
The results of the study show that women who got screening mammograms at centers using CAD devices were more likely to be told their mammogram was abnormal and thus undergo a biopsy to rule out breast cancer. Use of CAD did not clearly improve the detection of breast cancer. The research was conducted by investigators at the University of California, Davis, and colleagues in the National Cancer Institute-supported Breast Cancer Surveillance Consortium. Joanne Elmore, professor of medicine at the UW, participated in the study.
CAD software analyzes the mammogram image and marks suspicious areas for the radiologist to review, in theory assisting them in determining which images could lead to lethal tumors. CAD was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 1998 and has been incorporated into many mammography imaging practices, but its effect on the accuracy of interpretation has been unclear.
To conduct their study, investigators looked at the use of screening mammography in 222,135 women who had 429,345 mammograms. The period of observation was from 1998 through 2002 and took place at 43 facilities in Colorado, New Hampshire, and Washington.
Seven facilities, representing 16 percent of the study sites, implemented computer-aided detection during the study period. With the use of CAD, 31 percent more women were unnecessarily recalled for more tests and 20 percent more women had a breast biopsy. Use of the software had no clear impact on the early detection of breast cancer.
The work suggests that other diagnostic tests may also be needed to find cancer at its earliest stages, and that researchers should look for ways to improve CAD in breast cancer detection.
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CEREMONY APRIL 30 TO HONOR THE LATE ROBERT PETERSDORF
A ceremony scheduled for April 30 will honor the late Robert G. Petersdorf, a physician and administrator who led tremendous growth of the UW Department of Medicine in the 1960s and 70s and became a national leader in academic medicine. Petersdorf died last September at age 80.
The celebration of Petersdorf's distinguished career is scheduled from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m., Monday, April 30, in Hogness Auditorium, Room A-420 of the UW Health Sciences Center. A reception will follow the presentation. The event is free and open to all.
The presentation will cover Petersdorf's many contributions to academic medicine through the different phases of his career, including his training at Yale University, his tenure at the UW, and his time at the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). The event will include remarks from Dr. Paul G. Ramsey, dean of the UW School of Medicine; James Wallace, UW professor of medicine; Harry Kimball, senior advisor to the dean of medicine at the UW; William Bremner, the Robert G. Petersdorf Professor and Chair of Medicine at the UW; and speakers from the AAMC, Brown University, and the University of California, San Francisco.
Petersdorf served as the second chair of the Department of Medicine at the UW medical school, leading the department from 1964 to 1979. During his tenure as chair, the department grew from 69 faculty to 322, added several new divisions, and began operations in general medical clinics at the UW's teaching hospitals. He left the UW in 1979 to become dean of the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, and later served as president of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. He was president of the AAMC from 1986 to 1994, where he made significant contributions to the nation's medical education system.
In 1995, after retiring as president of the AAMC, Petersdorf returned to Seattle, with appointments at the VA medical center and the UW medical school. That year, the UW created the Robert G. Petersdorf Endowed Chair of Medicine, to be held by each chair of the Department of Medicine.
For more information, contact Barbara Mahoney at bmahoney@u.washington.edu or 206-543-7718. Parking for the event has been arranged for the S-1 parking lot behind the UW Health Sciences Center; check in at the gate for entry to the parking lot.
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Online News is published by Health Sciences/UW Medicine News and
Community Relations.
Justin Reedy, editor:
206-685-0382, jreedy@u.washington.edu
Online News is copyright 2007. All rights, including electronic
redistribution, are reserved.
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