Faculty News Weekly Round-Up: May 3, 2019

Edward H. Egelman, PhD, of the School of Medicine, has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, one of the highest honors for a scientist. Egelman was among 100 new members elected to the National Academy this week, bringing the number of active members to 2,347.

“This is an amazing honor,” he said. “It is truly gratifying to have my work receive such recognition.”

Egelman is Harrison Distinguished Professor in UVA’s Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics. His work focuses on using cryo-electron microscopy and 3D modeling to map out the world that is far too small for even the most powerful light microscopes to see.

Egelman has attracted national and international headlines for discoveries such as how urinary tract infections take hold and how an almost indestructible virus survives and thrives in nearly boiling acid. One of his latest papers reveals how strange bacteria that live in soil and sediment can conduct electricity, potentially paving the way for tiny-but-ultrapowerful batteries and pacemakers without wires.

Read more: https://newsroom.uvahealth.com/…/edward-h-egelman-elected-…/

• Here’s How Cancer Hijacks Wound Healing to Create Its Own Blood Supply

Researchers at the School of Medicine have shed light on how cancers hijack the body’s natural wound-healing response to grow and spread.

The researchers have identified specific processes within endothelial cells – the cells that line blood vessels – that tumors use to build out their own blood supply. These processes are normally used by the body to repair tissue, heal injuries and grow new blood vessels, but tumors co-opt them to create blood vessels that will nourish them and feed their growth.

“A tumor is not just a ball of malignant cancer cells, right? It’s almost like a little miniature organ that creates or co-opts its own blood supply,” explained Andrew C. Dudley, PhD, of UVA’s Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology. “A tumor steals as it’s growing and developing. It steals physiological processes that help it along. And one of those processes is wound healing. And that’s what we’ve been studying – how the tumor subverts this process of wound healing.”

The researchers have published their findings in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. The research team consisted of James V. McCann, Lin Xiao, Dae Joong Kim, Omar F. Khan, Piotr S. Kowalski, Daniel G. Anderson, Chad V. Pecot, Salma H. Azam, Joel S. Parker, Yihsuan S. Tsai, Alisa S. Wolberg, Stephen D. Turner, Kohei Tatsumi, Nigel Mackman and Dudley.

Read more: https://newsroom.uvahealth.com/…/heres-how-cancer-hijacks-…/
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