In the final days of the Biden administration, six Vanderbilt faculty members were among nearly 400 researchers to receive the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). Established in 1996, the award is billed by the White House as the highest honor bestowed by the U.S. government on outstanding scientists and engineers in the early stages of their independent research careers.
Each year, with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy coordinating with participating federal departments and agencies, the awards program typically recognizes around 100 researchers; the Biden White House had not given the awards in previous years, with the consequence that this year’s PECASE count is exceptionally high.
“Congratulations to these six faculty members from across Vanderbilt on having been selected by President Biden for this outstanding award. We’re so proud of them and their accomplishments and excited by all that lies ahead for their research teams,” said Jennifer Pietenpol, PhD, Executive Vice President for Research, and chief scientific and strategy officer for Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
Jessica Ancker, PhD, MPH, professor of Biomedical Informatics: Ancher’s research centers on the optimal use of information and information technology to improve health care decision-making. Her focus includes health numeracy and data communication, human factors in clinical decision support, and health services research, especially the effect of health information technologies on health care quality. Programs include synthesizing evidence about how to present health-related data to patients, and examination of the effect of the abrupt transition to telehealth at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Erin Calipari, PhD, associate professor of Pharmacology: Calipari’s research seeks to characterize and modulate the precise circuits in the brain that underlie both adaptive and maladaptive processes in reward, motivation and associative learning, to develop improved treatments for complex and devastating psychiatric disorders. This involves exploring how neural circuits integrate experiences with positive and negative stimuli to guide future behavior, and how information is stored and maintained within specific circuits on a molecular level.
You Chen, PhD, associate professor of Biomedical Informatics: Chen’s research is broadly concerned with opportunities to optimize health care processes. His research foci include medical data mining and machine learning, natural language processing, multi-site transfer learning, clinical workflow, care team identification, disease progression path modeling, predictive analytics, disease profiling and personalized medicine, hospital readmission and patient length of stay analytics, and health information security and privacy.
Maithilee Kunda, PhD, associate professor of Computer Science: Kunda’s work in artificial intelligence, in the area of cognitive systems, looks at how visual thinking contributes to learning and intelligent behavior, with a focus on applications for individuals on the autism spectrum. Her focus includes artificial intelligence, computational cognitive systems and interactive tools for education and assessment.
Eric Tkaczyk, MD, PhD, associate professor of Dermatology: From a base in biophotonics for diagnosis and treatment of skin diseases, Tkaczyk’s research seeks to integrate patient care, clinical investigation and technology with applications in dermatology, oncology, hematology and other specialties. Among his research specialties are noninvasive diagnostic technology, 3D imaging, machine learning, artificial intelligence and deep learning.
Steven Townsend, PhD, professor of Chemistry: Townsend’s current projects focus on applying organic chemistry to address key gaps in human health and wellness. His small molecule research program is focused on the synthesis of natural products that may prove clinically useful in the treatment of diseases ranging from cancer to neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s and Parkinson’s. With human milk contributing substantially to the establishment of a healthy gut microbiome in breastfed infants, another of Townsend’s programs seeks to define how oligosaccharides in human milk maintain microbiome homeostasis.
Vanderbilt’s past PECASE awardees have included Meena Madhur, MD, PhD, Craig Duvall, PhD, Bradley Malin, PhD, and Sharon Weiss, PhD.
