Dean's Note by Steven Leach, MD
Dear Colleagues,
Welcome to the very first issue of our new monthly newsletter, the Dean’s Office Update! We’re excited to launch this way to highlight the incredible work and achievements across our medical school. There’s so much happening at Geisel, and this newsletter will help us celebrate those moments together.
It’s hard to believe it’s been almost three months since I stepped into the role of dean of the medical school. What a busy and rewarding fall it has been! There have been a truly astounding number of exciting events over this short time. From welcoming our amazing new MD and health sciences students, to the inspiring White Coat Ceremony, the fascinating presentations and discussions at our Biomedical Research Day, the thought-provoking discussions during the Koop Symposium, the impactful discussion about youth mental health at our Surgeon General’s event, and the Innovation in Medicine & Healthcare Summit, this fall has been full of milestones. At the same time, we’ve also been deeply engaged in the search for the next director of the Dartmouth Cancer Center, a critical leadership role for our school and our partners at Dartmouth Health.
Alongside these events, we’ve had some exciting news to celebrate. President Sian Beilock and Professor Carrie Colla were elected to the National Academy of Medicine, a tremendous honor that speaks to the caliber of scholarship and leadership at Dartmouth. We launched the new Implementation Science COBRE, advancing research that will make a real-world difference in healthcare delivery. We also launched our new Learning Collaboratives for Flourishing in Medical Education, which aim to foster a holistic approach to medical education. And we were very proud to receive the 2025 Insight into Academia Higher Education Excellence and Distinction Award, recognizing our commitment to academic excellence, belonging, and community-building.
This first issue of our newsletter is just the beginning. Each month, we’ll share more of the good things happening at Geisel because there’s a lot to celebrate, and even more to look forward to.
Thank you for all you do to make this an extraordinary place to learn, teach, discover, and lead.
With gratitude,
Steve
DEAN'S OFFICE UPDATES
DICE Office
Thank you to the more than 100 community members who came to this year's Geisel Diwali celebration on Friday, November 7! The event was a huge success, providing bits of education and community building with participants through opening remarks and activities such as a mehendi station and paint-your-own diya station. The festive decorations and ambiance, amazing food from our friends at Taj E India, and lastly, an abundance of celebration and pride from community members made this event a special night to remember. The DICE Office wishes to thank Raman Mohan, MPH, Kiran Ganga M2, and Sonya Shah M2 for collaborating with us to plan this event, Kiran, Raman, and Dr. Roshini Pinto-Powell for the opening remarks, and the dozens of volunteers who assisted with set up and clean up, all who made this event such a huge success!
Faculty Affairs Updates
Congratulations to the following faculty members on their promotions:
- Matthew Mackwood, MD, Promotion to Associate Professor of Community and Family Medicine and of Health Policy & Clinical Practice
- James Ames, MD, Promotion to Associate Professor of Orthopaedics
- Wayne Moschetti, MD, Promotion to Associate Professor of Orthopaedics
- Caitlin Howe, PhD, Promotion to Associate Professor of Epidemiology
Medical & Healthcare Advancement
Because of our generous community of Geisel faculty, staff, alumni, and donors, more than $15,000 was invested in Geisel scholarships this GivingTuesday—and gifts are still coming in! Thank you for showing what’s possible when our community comes together.
If you were not able to join the GivingTuesday movement and would like to do so now, your generous donation will still help ensure our doors remain open to the best and brightest leaders in healthcare. Give to Geisel scholarships today.
Research Updates
A Task Force to improve efficiency of clinical research is well underway and several meetings have already occurred with more to come in early 2026. Co-leaders Dean Madden, Steve Bernstein, Susan Roberts, and Sheila Ryan are working with faculty from Dartmouth College, Geisel, and Dartmouth Health to identify barriers and solutions to making research efficient for all research with human subjects and human subjects data.
A new mapping project found that Geisel researchers are actively working in all six of the college-wide research priorities with more than 500 individual research projects. The college research priority areas are: Biomedical Futures; Rural Health and Society; Neuroscience and Mental Health; Cultivating Creativity; Economy, Democracy, and Security; and Climate, Energy, and Cryosphere Resilience.
DEPARTMENT & CENTER UPDATES
Biochemistry & Cell Biology
Awards: Professor Soni Lacefield has been honored with the Ira Herskowitz Award from the Genetics Society of America. This prestigious award recognizes “outstanding contributions in the field of yeast research in the last 20 years.” Dr. Muhammad Abubakar Khan (Madden and Cramer labs) was recently elected to the Dartmouth Postdoctoral Association (DPA) executive board as co-president. Dr. Khan is a postdoc in biochemistry and microbiology in the Madden and Cramer Labs. He combines creativity, collaboration, and curiosity in his work at Dartmouth.
Grants: Samantha Liu, a PhD candidate from the Shoemaker lab, received an F31 predoctoral fellowship from the NIH for her research investigating organelle-dependent quality control mechanisms of a special class of membrane proteins. Assistant Professor Prerna Malaney has been named a V Scholar by the V Foundation. This selective award supports cancer research by talented young scientists. Dr. Malaney’s laboratory works on the role of RNA-binding proteins in cancer, and her V Scholar project will focus on colorectal cancer. Professor Dean Madden and a team of Geisel researchers received renewed funding for the Dartmouth Cystic Fibrosis Research Center (DartCF). This P30 core grant from the NIH will fund 5 more years of innovation and collaboration from multiple labs at Geisel.
Papers: Dr. Sukrut Kamerkar, a postdoctoral researcher in Professor Henry Higgs’ lab, published a paper in Science Advances identifying a new role for the tumor suppressor LACTB in apoptosis. The work was a collaboration with Geisel Professor Ed Usherwood’s team in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. Dr. Madeline Chrupcala, a recent graduate student from Professor Jamie Moseley’s lab, published a paper in Molecular Biology of the Cell identifying new roles in cell division for the conserved protein kinase Pdk1. After completing her PhD, Dr. Chrupcala has started a postdoctoral research position at Yale University working the laboratory of Dr. Lily Kabeche, who has her own ties to BCB. Dr. Kabeche received her PhD from Dartmouth for work performed in BCB under the guidance of Professor Duane Compton’s lab. Amy Orr, a researcher in Professor Bill Wickner’s lab, published a paper defining how proteins including Sec17 and Sec18 assemble on membranes to promote fusion. This paper also included Wickner lab research Karina Lopes and Barlowe lab graduate student Jerry O’Dwyer as authors. Work from BCB Professor TY Chang and researcher Cathy Chang was also highlighted by Alzforum, including their commentary on ACAT1 inhibitors in Alzheimer’s Disease. The Chang lab have been leaders in studying and targeting the enzyme ACAT1 in atherosclerosis and Alzheimer’s Disease.
Center for Global Health Equity
With recent TB outbreaks in the US and NH, Drs. Lisa V. Adams (CGHE) and Elizabeth Talbot (DoM) were in Windhoek, Namibia in October to launch a collaborative study to improve the diagnosis and treatment of children and adolescents with TB. Namibia is a WHO-designated high TB-burden country with children and adolescents disproportionately affected. After supporting the Ministry of Health’s update of its national TB clinical guidelines, Dr. Adams partnered with Dr. Talbot and researchers from the University of Namibia and the National TB and Leprosy Programme to design a 2-phase survey to assess frontline healthcare worker competency before and after training on the updated guidelines. As of December 2, over 50% of the 254 expected HCW interviews at facilities across the country had been completed. This 2-phase study will both evaluate the effectiveness of the educational intervention and provide crucial insights into HCW preparedness for child and adolescent TB management in Namibia.
The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy & Clinical Practice
On November 17, TDI hosted a celebration of the National Academy of Medicine’s newest members from Dartmouth: President Sian Beilock, and Carrie Colla, the Susan J. and Richard M. Levy Distinguished Professor in Health Care Delivery.
The Dartmouth Health System Embedded Scientist Training and Research Center (E-STaR) is accepting applications from interested scientists.
Professor Albert Mulley was recognized by the Royal Society for Public Health for lifelong contributions to improving the public’s health in the UK and beyond.
TDI’s Health Economics and Policy Lab issued a policy brief on the complexities of GLP-1 coverage and costs.
TDI and partners at Geisel and DH are presenting the second annual Dartmouth Rural Health Symposium on May 12 and 13, 2026. Abstracts are due February 23!
TDI is hosting the 13th International Shared Decision Making Conference: A Wider Lens, Thinking bigger across primary care, cancer, serious illness and beyond, July 8-10, 2026. Abstracts are due December 19!
Epidemiology
Fiona McEnany, a MCB PhD student in Anne Hoen's lab, was selected for the Gerber Foundation Novice Research Award for her proposal entitled "Neonatal Influenza Antibody Transfer: The Effects of Fetal Sex and Gestational Age at Time of Maternal Vaccination." Fiona's project will evaluate the relationship between gestational age at the time of maternal influenza vaccination and fetal sex with neonatal influenza-specific antibody response. The results of her project will inform maternal immunization clinical practice to best protect infants during the most vulnerable period of their immunological development. Fiona is committed to maternal and child health research as demonstrated through numerous conference presentations and publications—including a paper in Pediatrics—and through a successful pilot study grant application to the Hitchcock Foundation last year. Fiona is active in the community as an Alumni Board Member of the New Hampshire IDeA Network of Biomedical Research Excellence and as the Chair of the Dartmouth Science, Technology, and Engineering Policy Society. Fiona is mentored by Dr. Anne Hoen, Associate Professor of Epidemiology, of Biomedical Data Science, and of Microbiology & Immunology.
Medical Education
Recently the Department of Medical Education began offering educational research journal discussions as part of their monthly Research Rounds. Dr. Michael Lee, Professor of Medical Education, who is leading the effort, is focused on building a shared understanding of current medical education research and techniques in order to establish evidence- and data-based educational practices to optimize learning at Geisel. As of now, four sessions (10/21, 12/15, 2/27, and 4/21) have been scheduled for this academic year. In October we kicked off with the article “AI-Standardardized Clinical Examination Training on OSCE Performance” introduced by Dr. Thomas Thesen. For December, we will delve into topics related to productive failure and cognitive integration of basic sciences and clinical knowledge. If interested in joining, please reach out to Kerry Schmitt.
In November, Dr. Nena Mason, Associate Professor of Medical Education, presented a medical education grand rounds entitled “Supporting the Student Writer: Strategies and Considerations for Involving Medical Students in Research Projects.” This invitation came from the Teaching Academy at Larner College of Medicine, University of Vermont. She had previously delivered this presentation here at Geisel as part of the Department of Medical Education Faculty Development Series and a copy of that recorded presentation is available; please contact Kerry Schmitt if you would like to view it.
Microbiology & Immunology
The Huang lab received a $250K gift from Yosemite, an oncology-focused venture capital firm, to Identify New Immunotherapy Targets through Computational Analyses.
M&I welcomed four new faculty: Felicia Goodrum, Chen Liao, Caitlin Kowalski, and Jarrod Smith. Caitlin and Jarrod were recruited collaboratively, with primary appointments in Dermatology and Medicine.
Work led by Matt Slein, MCB graduate student from the Ackerman and Leib labs, published in Science Translational Medicine showed improved efficacy of mAbs for the treatment of herpes simplex virus.
Work led by Carlos Ontiveros, MD/PhD student in the Curiel Lab, collaborating with the Sundrud, Turk, and Jakubzick labs published in Nature Communications improved our understanding of age effects on anti-cancer immunity.
Congratulations to Evelyn Turnbaugh, graduate student in the Leib Lab, the inaugural recipient of the Michael and Sharon Fanger Endowed Trainee Award.
Molecular & Systems Biology
In November, Assistant Professor Chengxiang Qiu joined the Molecular and Systems Biology department. Together with Staff Scientist Dr. Susan Huang, his lab will use genomic approaches to study cellular processes in normal development and in diseased states.
Dr. Shannon Paquette in the lab of Assistant Professor Dionna Kasper won a best poster prize for her presentation "Biological Sex Drives Distinct Hematopoietic Outcomes Following Inflammatory Challenge in Adult Zebrafish Marrow" at the Annual Meeting of the Zebrafish Disease Models Society and is a recent recipient of a NIH Postdoctoral Individual National Research Service Award (F32) from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.
In an exciting cross-department collaboration, the groups of Dr. Gio Bosco (MSB) and Dr. Felicia Goodrum (Microbiology and Immunology) have a paper coming out in Nucleic Acids Research showing that the human cytomegalovirus hijacks multiple human DNA repair pathways to ensure faithful replication of its own genome.
The MSB and Biochemistry and Cell Biology (BCB) departments are pleased to announce Dartmouth’s 2026 Fellows of the Albert J. Ryan Foundation, an award for promising graduate students at Geisel. The recipients (and research mentors) are:
- Pallavi Gadgill (Lacefield, BCB)
- Ian Gingerich (Frost and Goods, MSB)
- Jerry O’Dwyer (Barlowe, BCB)
- Hannah Stuart (McKenna, MSB)
- Carter Tracy (Shoemaker, BCB)
- Carolyn Winston (Kasper, MSB)
Orthopaedics
The Department of Orthopaedics has had an incredible year. Our patient access and volumes continue to increase and our department continues to grow. Most recently, we recruited Dr. Stella Lee, a specialist in orthopaedic oncology, who joins us from the University of Pittsburgh. We are continuing to work to expand orthopaedic oncology for our community and increase access for patients throughout the Upper Valley.
Multiple surgeons in the department have been commended for their excellence in teaching and surgery, including Dr. Rameez Qudsi who was named OSC surgeon of the year by the CST students for excellence in teaching and surgery, Dr. Fran Faro who was recognized by our Geisel medical students for her outstanding contributions in creating a positive learning environment, and Dr. Jamie Ames who was recognized for his global health work in the Dominican Republic with One World Surgery.
We have had three promotions to associate professor this year, including Dr. Adam Pearson, effective July 1, 2025, and Drs. James Ames and Wayne Moschetti, effective July 1, 2026. On the national stage, multiple faculty members have roles in orthopaedic leadership, including Dr. Leah Gitajn as the Orthopaedic Trauma Association Program Chair and Dr. Anna Miller as the American Orthopaedic Association Program Chair. Research is also thriving in the Department of Orthopaedics with Drs. Eric Henderson and Leah Gitajn leading the way in their respective areas including multiple new and renewals of NIH grants, including R01. The METRC (Major Extremity Trauma Research Consortium) also awarded the research team for their data quality.
Save the Date
- January 13 - Geisel's New Year Celebration. 4:30 PM at Top of the Hop. RSVP at dartgo.org/Welcome2026
- March 20 - Match Day, 11:30 AM, Spaulding Auditorium (Ticketed Event)
- May 8 - MD Class of 2026 Faculty and Student Awards, 1:00 PM, DHMC Auditorium H
- May 9 - MD Class 2026 Investiture, 9:00 AM, Lebanon Opera House (Ticketed Event)
- June 3 - Dean's State of the Medical School Address, 4:30 PM, DHMC Auditorium G
- June 11, Health Science Class of 2026 Awards (Time/location TBA)
- June 12, Health Science Class of 2026 Investiture (Time/location TBA)
More at Geisel Events Calendar
The Dean's Office Update is an internal news platform for Geisel School of Medicine faculty, students, and staff.