featured research

Clinical pharmacologist Jens Titze, M.D., and colleagues have discovered that – in contrast to the prevailing dogma – human sodium levels fluctuate rhythmically with 7-day and monthly cycles.

"Beyond the damaging effects on the health of our people, disrupting the nation’s biomedical science infrastructure puts our economic future at risk," writes Vice Chancellor for Health Affairs Jeff Balser in The Tennessean.

Patient handovers matter. A lot. That’s the conclusion from Vanderbilt researchers who reviewed three years of patient data and found that major complications occurring within 24 hours after cardiac surgery were cut in half following the adoption of an improved handover process.

Vanderbilt University scientists are cheering this year’s Nobel Prize in Medicine for recognizing the discovery that mature cells can be “reprogrammed” into other cell types — a finding which they said has electrified their work.

An analysis of Massachusetts’ health care reform program by a Vanderbilt researcher indicates insurance gaps may remain as the Affordable Care Act (ACA) expands insurance coverage beginning in 2014.

There is insufficient evidence to support findings, good or bad, for therapies currently used in adolescents and young adults with autism.

Creating a device out of human cells that simulates brain chemistry is the goal of a $6.4 million grant which is part of major new federal initiative to develop a series of “organs on a chip” designed to improve the drug development process.