Congratulations to Irfan Lodhi, PhD; Jeffrey R. Millman, PhD; Maria S. Remedi, PhD; and Julie M. Silverstein, MD of Washington University’s Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Lipid Research on achieving full professorship in their scientific and medical careers! The doctors were proudly joined by their colleagues on Thursday, August 22 to honor and celebrate their achievement.
Dr. Irfan Lodhi attended the division in 2007 as a postdoctoral research fellow studying lipid metabolism in the Semenkovich Lab. Prior, he had attended Michigan Medical School to study signaling pathways involved in insulin-stimulated glucose transports in adipocytes under the mentorship of Dr. Alan Saltiel. In 2011, Dr. Lodhi became a faculty member within the division and developed his own research lab. Lodhi Lab is focused on understanding the role of peroxisomal dynamics in adipose tissue development and function, while also understanding the interaction of peroxisomes with other organelles.
Dr. Jeffrey Millman joined the Department of Medicine as a faculty member in 2015, after completing his postdoctoral research fellowship at Harvard University. Alongside his colleague Dr. Douglas Melton, he developed methods to generate functional pancreatic insulin-producing β cells from human stem cells. Millman Lab’s research focuses on in vitro production and the study of pancreatic insulin-producing β cells from human pluripotent stem cells for use in cellular replacement therapy and drug screening. In a recent article titled “Disrupting Type One Diabetes,” Dr. Millman shares more on his journey in the field.
Dr. Maria Remedi joined the Department of Medicine as a Faculty member in 2015 to continue her studies on diabetes mellitus and congenital hyperinsulinism. During her postdoctoral training, she received the American Diabetes Association Minority Fellowship Award to support her work on the progression of diabetes. As a former faculty member of the department of Cell Biology and Physiology, Dr. Remedi had been studying the role and consequences of altered ion channels in diabetes and hyperinsulinism. Remedi Lab is determined to understand the underlying mechanisms of diabetes, pancreatic β-cell failure and loss of antidiabetic drug responsivity in different forms of diabetes. She has critically demonstrated that insulin producing β-cells do not die in diabetes progression, but instead they lose their identity becoming progenitor-like cells. She also demonstrated that this is a reversible process, challenging the existing paradigm of permanent β-cell damage, with critical implications for the treatment of diabetes.
Dr. Julie Silverstein joined the division in 2010 as a faculty member, after completing her endocrinology fellowship at WashU. She is the medical director for the Pituitary Center and the director of the Clinical Trials Unit, which runs clinical trials for patients with pituitary disorders, diabetes and other endocrine disorders. Dr. Silverstein’s research interests include diabetes, perioperative management of patients with pituitary tumors, and medical management of patients with acromegaly, Cushing’s disease and other neuro-endocrine diseases.