The Future is Now: Frontiers on Display at Yale-NAVBO Cardiovascular Inflammation and Remodeling Symposium 2014

Earlier this year, 200 researchers from across the globe gathered at the Omni New Haven Hotel at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, for 3 days of talks from 30 of the leading pioneers in modern cardiovascular medicine. From May 8 to 10, 2014, scientists discussed and dissected topics ranging from the clinical treatment of atherosclerosis to the molecular biology of leukocyte-endothelial cell interactions. With other sessions exploring vascular malformation and aneurysm, hypertension, the endothelial-mesenchymal transition (endo-MT), and the role of metabolism in cardiovascular disease, conference participants gained striking insights into rapid advances and ongoing challenges in the field of cardiovascular inflammation and remodeling.     

Advances in ovarian cancer screening: health and medicine for women: a multidisciplinary, evidence-based review of mid-life health concerns

Early detection is imperative for improving survival from ovarian cancer, the leading cause of death from gynecological cancer in the United States. At the Health and Medicine for Women continuing medical education (CME) conference at Yale in September 2010, Dr. Gil Mor, a researcher in the Department of OB/GYN at Yale, presented recent advances on the pathophysiology of ovarian cancer. These advances, and particularly our growing understanding of cancer stem cells, may help overcome the limitations of current ovarian cancer detection and treatment methods.     

The first fifty years of the Connecticut Tumor Registry: reminiscences and prospects

The first fifty years of the Connecticut Tumor Registry (1935-1985) have seen unprecedented progress in the collection of standardized data on cancer patients and in the processing of these data, from paper documents to punch cards and magnetic tapes. The need for collecting such information was first recognized, in the early 1930s, by a group of physicians, health professionals, and laymen in New Haven who observed alarming increases in cancer rates and poor survival of cancer patients in this city. This paper recalls the growth and development of the registry and the role played by the Connecticut legislature, the State Medical Society, the Connecticut Department of Health, and the National Cancer Institute in this process. For half a century, the registry has provided assistance to practitioners, hospitals, and research scientists, not only in Connecticut but across the country and around the world. By making available reliable data on incidence and survival, the registry has played a key role in patient management, clinical trials, and etiologic studies. It has also demonstrated the value and served as an exemplary model of a population-based registry. At this juncture in its history, prospects for the future of the Connecticut Tumor Registry appear bright. Its data base will be an essential resource for the recently established Cancer Control Research Unit (CCRU) in the state and for new intervention studies by investigators at Yale, the University of Connecticut, and the State Health Department.     

Second Meeting of the International Society for Phylogenetic Nomenclature: a Report

The Second Meeting of the International Society for Phylogenetic Nomenclature (ISPN) convened at Yale University in New Haven from June 28 to July 2, 2006. In addition to contributed talks, the conference included symposia on phylogenetic nomenclature of species, phyloinformatics, and implementing phylogenetic nomenclature. Other discussion focused on recent controversial additions to the draft PhyloCode concerning the choice of names for total clades, and the Committee on Phylogenetic Nomenclature (CPN) was encouraged to revisit this issue. A proposal to permit emendation of phylogenetic definitions without CPN approval under certain circumstances was well received, and there was wide support for a proposed mechanism to use Linnaean binomina in the context of phylogenetic nomenclature without extending the PhyloCode to govern species names. The ISPN Council voted to expand the CPN from 9 to 12 members.     

The Global Crisis of Malaria: Report on a Yale Conference

An international conference, “The Global Crisis of Malaria: Lessons of the Past and Future Prospects,” met at Yale University, November 7-9, 2008. The symposium was organized by Professor Frank Snowden and sponsored by the Provost’s office, the MacMillan Center, the Program in the History of Science and History of Medicine, and the Section of the History of Medicine at the Yale School of Medicine. It brought together experts on malaria from a variety of disciplines, countries, and experiences — physicians, research scientists, historians of medicine, public health officials, and representatives of several non-governmental organizations (NGOs). An underlying theme was that much could be gained from a big-picture examination across disciplinary frontiers of the contemporary public health problem caused by malaria. Particular features of the conference were its intense scrutiny of historical successes and failures in malaria control and its demonstration of the relevance of history to policy discussions in the field.     

Dr. Haifan Lin. Interviewed by Han Lee and Rachel Rosenstein

Dr. Haifan Lin is professor of Cell Biology at Yale University, where he studies the mechanism of stem cell self-renewal in fruit flies, mice, and human cancer cells. Recently named director of the Yale Stem Cell Center, Dr. Lin has made seminal contributions to the stem cell field, most notably his demonstration of the stem cell niche theory using the fruit fly model, his discovery of the PIWI/AGO gene family that is essential for stem cell division in diverse organisms, and his recent finding of a group of small RNAs called PIWI-interacting, or piRNAs, which may play a crucial role in stem cell proliferation and germline development. Dr. Lin’s work on piRNAs was recognized by Science Magazine as a top scientific breakthrough of 2006. Recently, the Lin lab has begun exploring the role of these molecules in stem cell division and oncogenesis.     

Human psychophysics: Functional interpretation for contrast sensitivity versus spatial frequency curve

The hypothesis that neural processing in the human visual pathways compensates for both optical degradation as well as noise contamination at the photoreceptor level is introduced and shown to be consistent with the high frequency portion of the contrast sensitivity function for threshold detection of sinusoidal gratings in addition to the suprathreshold phenomenon of matching sinusoidal gratings of different spatial frequencies. This offers a unifying interpretation for why, at threshold conditions, the high spatial frequency portion of the image is blurred as severely by the nervous system as it is by the optics (e.g. Campbell and Green, 1965) while in extreme suprathreshold conditions the nervous system effectively deblurs the image (e.g. Georgeson and sullivan, 1975; Kulikowski, 1976). These conclusions do not necessitate a highly specific form of visual processing such as Fourier channeling.This research was conducted at Yale University, Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Science, New Haven, Connecticut, USA, throughout which period A.W.S. was a John Simon Guggenheim fellow     

Mitochondria in biology and medicine

Ever since the first diagnosis of a mitochondrial disease in 1959 (Ernster et al., 1959), the interest for mitochondrial cytopathies has continued to increase. Originally it was believed that the condition was very rare and primarily effected high-energy requiring tissues resulting in a select few pathologies (Luft, 1994). Since 1959, the understanding of mitochondrial cytopathies has evolved immensely and mitochondrial cytopathies are now known to be the largest group of metabolic diseases and to be resulting in a wide variety of pathologies. "Mitochondria in Biology and Medicine" was the title of the first annual conference of Society of Mitochondrial Research and Medicine - India. The conference was organized by A. S. Sreedhar, Keshav Singh and Kumarasamy Thangaraj, and was held at The Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) Hyderabad, India, during 9-10 December 2011. The conference featured talks from internationally renowned scientists within the field of mitochondrial research and offered both students and fellow researchers a comprehensive update to the newest research within the field. This paper summarizes key outcomes of the presentations.     

Helping Science and Drug Development to Succeed through Pharma-Academia Partnerships: Yale Healthcare Conference 2013

The theme of the 2013 Yale Healthcare Conference was “Partnerships in Healthcare: Cultivating Collaborative Solutions.” The April conference brought together leaders across several sectors of health care, including academic research, pharmaceuticals, information technology, policy, and life sciences investing. In particular, the breakout session titled “Taking R&D Back to School: The Rise of Pharma-Academia Alliances” centered on the partnerships between academic institutions and pharmaceutical companies. Attendees of the session included members of the pharmaceutical industry, academic researchers, and physicians, as well as graduate and professional students. The discussion was led by Dr. Thomas Lynch of Yale University. Several topics emerged from the discussion, including resources for scientific discovery and the management of competing interests in collaborations between academia and the pharmaceutical industry.     

From Habits to Self-Regulation: How Do We Change?

The Yale Cognitive Science department hosted the conference “From Habits to Self-Regulation: How Do We Change?” on November 4 and 5, 2011, to showcase current research on self-control in cognitive science, psychology, and neuroscience. The conference included a panel discussion by four philosophers who gave context for the scope and limitations of research on self-control. The common theme concerning the best method to attain lasting change included becoming aware of what one wants to change, increasing commitment to the goal of change, and imagining all of the potential problems and solutions to those problems.     

Single Cell Genomics meeting in Stockholm: from single cells to cell types

A report on the second Single Cell Genomics conference held in Stockholm, Sweden, September 9–11, 2014.The second Single Cell Genomics conference was held in Stockholm and hosted by the Karolinska Institute. The ‘Venice of the North’ was the setting for an exciting and intense meeting, with scientists from very different disciplines tackling the numerous challenges that single cell genomics presents.During three days, 35 talks and more than 60 posters addressed many aspects of single cell genomics, from new experimental techniques to computational strategies for data analysis. We report on some of the main themes that emerged and, in our opinion, best illustrate the progress made and the new directions being undertaken by the field.     

Yellow ooze

This is a piece from the annual Yale Internal Medicine Residency Program's Writers' Workshop, which began in 2003. Abraham Verghese and Richard Selzer, among the best known physician-writers in the United States, have served as workshop leaders, teaching the craft of writing to more than 35 residents. In designing the workshop, Anna B. Reisman, assistant professor in the Department of Internal Medicine at the Yale University School of Medicine and VA Connecticut Health Care System, and Dr. Asghar Rastegar had the goal of making participants better physicians by providing a creative outlet for reflection.The stories and essays written by the Writers' Workshop participants present a range of experiences, real and imagined, and take readers deep into the minds of young doctors trying to make sense of what they do.     

Sequence Thyself: Personalized Medicine and Therapies for the Future: 2012 Yale Healthcare Conference

Now in its 8th year, the Yale Healthcare Conference has arguably come upon its most exciting and dramatic time within the U.S. health care system. Dynamic speakers from all over the country came together in April 2012 at Yale University to question, debate, creatively think, and examine challenges within health care organizations and institutions. One of the most prominent issues concerned the aftermath of sequencing the human genome and the explosion of information concerning gene polymorphisms and biomarkers in health and disease. Clinicians, scientists, and pharmaceuticals are looking to innovative individually tailored treatments for patients. During the conference breakout session, speakers Thomas Lynch, MD, director of the Yale Cancer Center and physician-in-chief of the Smilow Cancer Hospital, and Zen Chu, MBA, co-founder of Accelerated Medical Ventures and entrepreneur-in-residence at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, provided enriching discussion on the delivery of science and genetic care of the individual.     

The apology

This is the second issue featuring a selected piece from the Yale Internal Medicine Residency Program's Writers' Workshop. The annual workshop began in 2003. Abraham Verghese and Richard Selzer, among the best known physician-writers in the United States, have served as workshop leaders, teaching the craft of writing to more than 35 residents. In designing the workshop, Anna B. Reisman, assistant professor in the Department of Internal Medicine at the Yale University School of Medicine and VA Connecticut Health Care System, and Dr. Asghar Rastegar had the goal of making participants better physicians by providing a creative outlet for reflection.The stories and essays written by the Writers' Workshop participants present a range of experiences, real and imagined, and take readers deep into the minds of young doctors trying to make sense of what they do.     

The Yale Affiliated Hospital Program in Internal Medicine

In July, 1975, the Departments of Internal Medicine at the Yale University School of Medicine and eight community hospitals in southern and western Connecticut formed the Yale Affiliated Hospital Program (YAHP) in Internal Medicine. The YAHP provides a planned and focused program of continuing education for medical staff and housestaff at the affiliated hospitals. Six formats for the over 1,000 rounds, lectures, and conferences given annually are used. The members of the YAHP also cooperate in housestaff and faculty recruiting, evaluation of quality of care and evaluation of the process of continuing medical education itself. This report summarizes the organization, goals and future plans of the YAHP.     

2009 Society for Medical Anthropology Conference: Changing Anthropology,Changing Society

Fifty years after the founding of the field of medical anthropology, the Society for Medical Anthropology of the American Anthropological Association held its first independent meeting on September 24-27, 2009, at Yale University.Fifty years after the founding of the field of medical anthropology, the Society for Medical Anthropology of the American Anthropological Association held its first independent meeting on September 24-27, 2009, at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. The conference, Medical Anthropology at the Intersections, drew an international audience of more than 1,000 scholars.In her opening remarks, program Chair Marcia Inhorn noted that medical anthropology has been interdisciplinary since its inception. This assertion was supported at a roundtable discussion, Founding Medical Anthropology and the Society for Medical Anthropology, which featured four of the field’s founders.Asked to identify the factors that led to the development of medical anthropology, the panelists emphasized the role of changes in the practice and landscape of medicine in the late 1950s and early 1960s in the United States. According to Hazel Weidman, who helped spearhead the Society for Medical Anthropology, medical personnel sought social scientists’ guidance in the new clinical environments created by the increasing involvement of U.S. physicians in global development work and by the community-oriented approach to mental health encouraged by the Community Mental Health Act of 1963. The novel inclusion of lifestyle as a determinant of health at this time also played a role, according to Clifford Barnett. Norman Scotch, author of a 1963 review that had helped define medical anthropology as a field, noted that physicians at the time were very interested in the possible applications of the social sciences to medicine [1,2]. Joan Ablon recalled that this emphasis on application led some academic anthropologists to dismiss the medical anthropologist as a “handmaiden to the doctors.” Despite such resistance, interest in medical anthropology as a sub-field was clearly growing among anthropologists. When Weidman helped organize the first gathering of medical anthropologists at an anthropology conference in 1967, attendance was twice what was expected. Panel organizer Alan Harwood noted that the Society for Medical Anthropology transformed its newsletter into a professional journal, Medical Anthropology Quarterly, in 1983. According to Inhorn, the society has 1,300 members today.For the panelists, medical anthropology’s potential for application makes it a compelling scholarly pursuit. As Barnett stated in explaining his decision to work in anthropology: “If you know how a society works, you can change it.”     

A close call: the role of screening mammography in the fight against breast cancer: health and medicine for women: a multidisciplinary, evidence-based review of mid-life health concerns

A multidisciplinary panel debated the role of screening mammography in fighting breast cancer during the Health and Medicine for Women continuing medical education (CME) conference at Yale Medical School in September 2010. Different guidelines from professional societies have presented conflicting recommendations for patients regarding both the benefits of mammography and the appropriate age and frequency of screening. In addition, a recent longitudinal study argues that screening mammography may only offer a modest benefit in terms of reducing cancer mortality. In light of these considerations, the panel debated whether mammography should be an informed decision that must be discussed and individualized for each patient based on the context of risk factors such as family history, age, and genetic dispositions.     

G-ruption: The third international meeting on G-quadruplex and G-assembly

A three and a half day conference focusing on nucleic acid structures called G-quadruplexes (G4s) and other guanine-based assemblies was held in Sorrento, Italy (June 28–July 1, 2011) and featured 35 invited talks and over 89 posters. The G-quadruplex field continues to expand at an explosive rate with the emergence of new connections to biology, chemistry, physics, and nanotechnology. Following the trend established by the previous two international G4 meetings, the conference touched upon all these areas and facilitated productive exchanges of ideas between researchers from all over the world.     

Meeting report: the Institute for Genomic Research/Wellcome Trust Conference: Genomes 2004 14-17 April 2004, the Wellcome Trust Conference Centre, the Wellcome Trust Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridge, UK

This conference brought the microbial genomics community together to share their most up-to-the-minute achievements, so much so that several talks cannot be covered here, as the work discussed has not yet been published. This meeting report has details of a cross-section of the talks from the sessions on 'Genome analysis and comparative genomics', 'Computational genomics' and 'Functional genomics', ranging from studies on complex environmental samples, to specific pathogenic bacteria, to yeasts.     

Systemic Candida infections.

Over the past two decades, Candida species have come to be regarded as important agents of nosocomial infection. In this paper, initially presented as a teaching conference at the Yale University School of Medicine, we summarize recent information pertaining to the epidemiology, diagnosis, and treatment of systemic Candida infections.