Anesthesiology and Critical Care NIH T32 Directors
T32 PI's
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Read More about Max B. Kelz, MD, PHDMax B. Kelz, MD, PHD
PI and Lee A. Fleisher Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care
Email Max B. Kelz, MD, PHD
Max B. Kelz, MD, PHD Website
Max B. Kelz, MD, PHD
PI and Lee A. Fleisher Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care
kelzma@pennmedicine.upenn.edu
Max B. Kelz, MD, PHD Website
Dr. Kelz has been continuously NIH funded for nearly two decades for his mechanistic research in the neurobiology of arousal and anesthetic-induced hypnotic states. In recognition of his impactful early career work, he was awarded the ASA Presidential Scholar Award in 2010. Dr. Kelz has focused on improving the physician scientist pipeline in Anesthesiology and has run the Department’s Dripps Scholars program since 2014. He was appointed as the inaugural Steering Committee Chair of the Anesthesia Research Council (ARC) in 2019. He has served as the PI of this PPRTPM T32 grant since 2019. In 2022, he succeeded Dr. Rod Eckenhoff as the Vice Chair for Research in the Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care. Dr. Kelz has served as a long-time mentored research training grant study section member both for the ASA Committee on Research and for the International Anesthesia Research Society (IARS)—before he became an IARS trustee. Dr. Kelz has a remarkable mentorship record, having mentored dozens of medical students, residents, graduate students and junior faculty. For his clear prowess in the area, he was elected to the Academy of Research Mentors in Anesthesia (ARMA). Most recently, Dr. Kelz was chosen to be the President and Chief Scientific Officer of the Foundation for Anesthesia Education and Research (FAER), whose primary mission is the development of the next generation of physician scientists in perioperative medicine. Dr Kelz is currently serving as the faculty mentor to PPRTPM T32 trainee, Aaron Krom, BMBCh PhD.
Dr. Kelz is an authority on the neurobiology of sleep and arousal as well as on the neural circuits upon which general anesthetics act to elicit their hypnotic effects. His research is conducted predominantly in mice but he has translated his findings about CNS systems mediating entry into and exit from the anesthetic state across evolution from fruit flies, to zebrafish, and into humans as well. His research is highly interdisciplinary: he employs techniques ranging from behavioral genetics to slice electrophysiology, from viral mediated CNS circuit function to 3D reconstruction of EEG and ECoG potentials, and from fluorescence microscopy to in vivo fiber photometry, opto- and chemogenetics. He is presently an MPI on two NIH R01 grants, internal PENN seed grants, and a multi-institutional foundation grant seeking to better understand human consciousness.
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Read More about Roderic G. Eckenhoff, MDRoderic G. Eckenhoff, MD
MPI and Austin Lamont Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care
Email Roderic G. Eckenhoff, MD
Roderic G. Eckenhoff, MD Website
Roderic G. Eckenhoff, MD
MPI and Austin Lamont Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care
roderic.eckenhoff@pennmedicine.upenn.edu
Roderic G. Eckenhoff, MD Website
Dr. Eckenhoff has been continuously NIH-funded for almost 35 years, from both NIGMS and NIA. His principal areas have included molecular pharmacology of general anesthetics, anesthetic drug discovery, and the perioperative neurocognitive disorders. His stellar research scholarship was formally recognized in 2019 by Anesthesiology, when he was chosen to give the national FAER Helrich Lecture. Dr. Eckenhoff has trained many dozens of various learners, including undergraduates, graduate students, residents, post-doctoral fellows and current junior faculty— Drs. Bedell, Joseph, and White (GM112596 trainees). His mentees have gone on to prominence; many are full professors at PENN and elsewhere. He was a founding member of the Academy of Research Mentors in Anesthesia (ARMA). Dr. Eckenhoff was awarded the FAER Research Mentor of the Year Award in 2012. He is currently a member of the FAER Board of Directors and the Vice Chair of FAER’s Grants Management Committee. As a testament to his many years of faculty mentoring, Dr. Eckenhoff was recently appointed Assistant Dean for Faculty Affairs at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine and the Chair of the Perelman School of Medicine’s Committee on Appointments and Promotions—a position perfectly suited for advising trainees on their career trajectory and path. Dr Eckenhoff served as the faculty mentor to recent PPRTPM T32 trainees, Victoria Bedell, MD, PhD and E. Railey White, MD, PhD.
Dr. Eckenhoff’s primary research focus has been in the molecular pharmacology of general anesthetics, particularly the volatile anesthetics, and more recently, the alkylphenols. This research leans heavily on chemical biological methods, continues to evolve, and was supported by a multidisciplinary program project grant (P01 GM55876) for 22 years. In conducting this research, effects of anesthetics on protein structure and function were discovered that should translate to neurodegenerative diseases, an area of investigation that has blossomed into a second major and translational focus of his laboratory. Dr. Eckenhoff has also initiated a drug discovery program, using high-throughput approaches to reveal novel anesthetic chemotypes. These areas have led to plausible new mechanisms contributing to anesthetic action, and the testing of unique anesthetics, using our unique photochemical tools, to discover novel anesthetic targets.
T32 Executive Committee, Track Directors, Incoming
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Read More about Meghan B. Lane-Fall, MD, MSPHMeghan B. Lane-Fall, MD, MSPH
Director, Perioperative Health Services Track, David E. Longnecker Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care
Email Meghan B. Lane-Fall, MD, MSPH
Meghan B. Lane-Fall, MD, MSPH Website
Meghan B. Lane-Fall, MD, MSPH
Director, Perioperative Health Services Track, David E. Longnecker Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care
Meghan.LaneFall@pennmedicine.upenn.edu
Meghan B. Lane-Fall, MD, MSPH Website
Dr. Lane-Fall is the David E. Longenecker Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care and the Executive Director of the Penn Implementation Science Center at LDI (PISCE) at Penn. Dr. Lane-Fall was the Department’s inaugural Vice-Chair for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. She, and fellow trainer Dr. Mark Neuman, were the Co-Founders and Co-Directors of the Department’s Center for Perioperative Outcomes Research and Transformation (CPORT). Dr. Lane-Fall is deeply committed to post-doctoral research training and mentoring as demonstrated by the 10 post-doctoral fellows she has or is currently mentoring, out of 81 total mentees thus far. Dr. Lane-Fall’s primary focus is implementation science with significant additional expertise in qualitative and mixed methods research. Her research is focused on the scientific study of strategies to support safe, high-quality, patient-centered care, bridging implementation science and human factors engineering to promote the uptake and sustained use of evidence-based teamwork and communication approaches. This work has demonstrated the value of considering workflow and workload in acute care implementation efforts. Dr. Lane-Fall’s collaborative research brings an implementation focus to projects in maternal health, environmental justice, cancer care, critical care, and other areas. A third important focus of the Lane-Fall Lab is training, mentoring, and capacity building efforts in implementation science and health services research more broadly. Dr. Lane-Fall is currently the PI or MPI on four NIH grants.
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Read More about Alexander Proekt, MD, PhDAlexander Proekt, MD, PhD
Perioperative Neuropharmacology, Associate Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care
Email Alexander Proekt, MD, PhD
Alexander Proekt, MD, PhD Website
Alexander Proekt, MD, PhD
Perioperative Neuropharmacology, Associate Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care
proekt@gmail.com
Alexander Proekt, MD, PhD Website
Dr. Proekt is an Associate Professor in the Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care with joint appointments in the Departments of Physiology, Pharmacology, and Neuroscience. He is the co-director of Penn’s center for the NEuroscience of Unconsciousness and Reanimation Research ALliance (NEURRAL). He received the ASA’s Presidential Scholar prize for impactful early career work in 2021. Dr. Proekt has extensive experience mentoring undergraduates, graduate, and MD/PhD students and has served as the PhD thesis advisor for six Neuroscience graduate and MD/PhD students. Dr. Proekt is interested in how processing of sensory stimuli is affected by the state of the brain. For this purpose, he deploys a combination of neurophysiological recordings performed in awake behaving animals, with two photon imaging of neuronal activity. His lab is also interested in developing novel computational techniques which yield interpretable models of observed brain dynamics. The Proekt lab has demonstrated that the brain undergoes a number of abrupt state transitions while recovering from anesthesia, even when held at a constant anesthetic concentration and without external stimuli. He has shown that these transitions are sufficient to give rise to anesthetic hysteresis, and perhaps, delirium. Dr Proekt is currently the PI on three R01s and has been continuously NIH funded for 10 years. Dr Proekt works closely other trainers on the T32 including, Drs Cichon, Contreras, Kelz, and McKinsrty-Wu.
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Read More about Gregory F. Corder, PhDGregory F. Corder, PhD
Director, Perioperative Pain Medicine, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry
Email Gregory F. Corder, PhD
Gregory F. Corder, PhD Website
Gregory F. Corder, PhD
Director, Perioperative Pain Medicine, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry
gcorder@upenn.edu
Gregory F. Corder, PhD Website
Dr. Corder is an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at PENN and a member of both the Neuroscience and Pharmacology Graduate Groups. He is the Co-Director for 2 Neuroscience Graduate Group courses. He is strongly committed to increasing diversity in research and is a member of the Diversity Action Plan for PENN Genomics (DAPPG) program. The research objective of the Corder laboratory is to decipher the mechanisms by which the brain generates the perception of pain. He also seeks to understand how pathological dysfunction within these brain networks promotes the transition from acute to chronic pain, and ultimately to drug abuse. Dr. Corder’s team employs advanced in vivo imaging of neural activity, rigorous neuropharmacology, and optical neuromodulation techniques, in preclinical rodent model systems, with the overall goals to deconstruct the brain circuits and molecular mechanisms involved in pain and opioid analgesia/side-effects. From his lab’s investigations, the goal is to identify translational targets for the development of novel therapeutics in order to reduce mental health disorders associated with chronic pain and lessen the reliance on prescription opioids. Dr. Corder is currently the PI/MPI on five NIH grants, including one with another of our trainers, Julie Blendy.
