Research!Louisville closes with update on overdose crisis and awards presentation

The closing ceremonies for Research!Louisville (R!L) 2024 reached standing-room-only capacity with faculty, staff and student research scholars, administrators, sponsors and guests. University of Louisville President Kim Schatzel gave a warm and engaging welcome to celebrate the final day of the weeklong series of poster sessions, lectures, workshops and training sessions.

In the keynote address, Nora D. Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, presented "The Overdose Crisis: Scientific Update," followed by a rigorous Q&A. Volkow's talk provided a current overview of the drug overdose epidemic, a top concern in Kentuckiana, and drew interest from UofL research scholars, community health, academic and clinical experts. As a research psychiatrist, Volkow pioneered the use of brain imaging to investigate how substance use affects brain functions.

Event co-chairs J. Christopher States and Amanda Jo LeBlanc led a steering committee with a mission to raise awareness about research, engage in fundraising for research initiatives and address health equity, to name a few of its goals.

"Research!Louisville's mission seeks to provide excellence in education, training and career development through interdisciplinary research collaborations designed to bring trainees and young and established research scientists together to work on finding solutions to the world's complex problems," said LeBlanc, interim associate dean for research in the UofL School of Medicine. "We engage with the most acclaimed research scientists to address our goals to achieve health equity, provide insight into the crucial topics of our time and advance translational and clinical research to improve human health."

R!L 2024, held Sept. 16-20 at the Kosair for Kids Clinical and Translational Research Building on the UofL Health Sciences Center, marked the 29^th year of showcasing health sciences research at the Louisville Medical Center.

The schedule of events during the week featured experts in a variety of disciplines. The week began with an inaugural symposium which highlighted breakthroughs in clinical and translational research. Other events included presentations by grant awardees funded by the Jewish Heritage Fund, a School of Nursing lecture about advancing equity in maternal and child health, the health equity keynote, "Disabusing Disability: Demonstrating Disability doesn't mean Inability," three mentoring training sessions, a series of presentations by the Center for Integrative Environmental Health Sciences and four days of research scholar poster sessions. The IRB featured workshops on human subjects mentoring and IRB protocol writing, as well as panels on navigating investigator initiated human subjects research.

In honor of National Postdoctoral Week, R!L hosted a postdoctoral research event spotlighting postdocs as the "unsung heroes of research." Among first-time events were a session that featured experts on the topics of animal welfare, science, government relations and public outreach and another that demonstrated the use of virtual reality for biomedical sciences.

The poster sessions showcased research by engineering graduate students, medical residents/clinical fellows, science graduate students, case reports, medical students, medical students in distinction tracks, postdoctoral associates/scholars, research associates and staff, public health graduate students, dental students, nursing graduate students and faculty, including faculty in the LIAM program. Awardees are listed below.

"Research!Louisville offers a window into UofL research and how it positively impacts our daily lives - from creating groundbreaking treatments to launching new companies," said Jon Klein, interim executive vice president for research and innovation. "I'm excited to see so many community members, researchers and aspiring researchers engage, learn and share those activities with the world."

R!L is a proud co-sponsor of the Kentucky Science Center's program for 8^th-12^th grade students in STEM programs. The KSC holds a half-day program including a real-time, open-heart surgery and sessions with health care research and medical professionals focusing on career options.

Recordings of the event sessions and a slide presentation of the award winners, as well as photographs have been posted on the R!L webpage.

RESEARCH!LOUISVILLE AWARDEES

Masters Basic Science Graduate Student Award
Morgann Delnicki 3rd Place
Dianet Sanchez Vega 2nd Place
Sayra Moni 1st Place

Doctoral Basic Science Graduate Student Award
Dana Hammouri 3rd Place
Katarina Mayer 2nd Place
Idoia Meaza Isusi 1st Place

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Award
Natural & Physical Sciences
Mustafizur Rahman 1st Place
Isaiah Burciaga 1st Place

Engineering Co-op Student Award
Ahmed Badr 3rd Place
Miriam Ismail 2nd Place
Rana Zayed 1st Place

Master Engineering Student Award
Kirsten Waits 3rd Place
Israa Sharaby 2nd Place
Mostafa Abdelrahim 1st Place

Doctoral Engineering Student Award
Ahmed Aboudessouki 3rd Place
Hossam Magdy Balaha 2nd Place
Mohamed Azam 1st Place

School of Dentistry Basic Sciences Student Award
Abigail Hacker 3rd Place
Samrat Tanwani 2nd Place
Jared Williams 1st Place

School of Dentistry Clinical Sciences Student Award
Jung-Woo Hong 3rd Place
Holland Bakker 2nd Place
Amanda Dilliha 1st Place

Rhonda A.Hoffman Medical Student Award
Idil Tuncali 2nd Place

Postdoctoral Fellow Award
Belinda Petri 2nd Place

Research Associate/Research Scientist Award
Jingjing Zhao 2nd Place
Yiqun Mo 1st Place

Research Staff Award
Harshini Sarojini Winner

Clinical Fellow Research Award - School of Medicine
Zaraq Khan Winner

Masters Program Student Award - School of Public Health & Information Sciences
Chandrima Chatterjee 1st Place

Doctoral Student Award - School of Public Health & Information Sciences
Irina Kondaurova Winner

Basic Research Award- School of Public Health & Information Sciences
Yiqun Mo 1st Place

Research & Practice Award- School of Public Health & Information Sciences
Carly Middleton 1st Place

Nursing Graduate Student Award - School of Nursing
Shubha Sapkota Winner

Faculty Basic Science Award
Sophia Sears Winner

Faculty Clinical Science Award
Nicole Herring Winner

Ruth Greenberg Award for Medical Education Research
Ellee Grosser 3rd Place
Ragan Howard 2nd Place
Nada Kaissich 1st Place

Leslie Martin Medical Education Student Award
Ally Render Winner
Sydney Wichmann Winner

Professional & Educational Development Award
Hannah Turner Winner
Raleigh Boulware Winner

Excellence in Health Disparities Research Award
Joy Adeleye 3rd Place
Shorye Durrett 1st Place

Postdoctoral Symposium: Unsung Heroes of Research Oral Presentation
Mohamed Shehata 2nd Place
Chase Hellner 1st Place