Penn State and Stanford Medicine Honor 2026 Research, Teaching and Community Achievements

Penn State College of Medicine recognized faculty, staff and trainees for their contributions to discovery, collaboration and meaningful impact during the 2026 Research and Innovation Awards luncheon held Tuesday, April 21, 2026. Separately, Stanford Medicine's Department of Epidemiology and Population Health (EPH) recently recognized faculty and students whose dedication, leadership, teaching, and service strengthened the department's community, with awards selected by EPH students.

At Penn State, the annual awards celebrate the breadth of the College's research enterprise, highlighting scientific achievement alongside the creativity and teamwork required to translate ideas into meaningful advances in health and patient care. The 2026 awards program was refreshed to better represent the evolving nature of research and innovation, with expanded categories highlighting interdisciplinary collaboration, operational excellence and impact across the College's areas of research eminence. The College dean said the awards reflect the full spectrum of the research community, from foundational discovery to real-world application.

Staff Excellence Awards went to Abbey Fisher (Catalyst for Innovation) and Carrie Criley (Catalyst for Research). Trainee awards recognized Karl Bohnenberger (Rising Star in Innovation) and Alexandra Nusawardhana (Rising Star in Research). Faculty Eminence Awards honored Arun Sharma (Adult and Pediatric Cancer, Innovation), George-Lucian Moldovan (Adult and Pediatric Cancer, Basic Science), Dajiang Liu (AI and Bioinformatics), Shyam Bansal (Cardiovascular, The Cardaci Family Award in Cardiology), Matthew Swulius (Multiscale Imaging), James Connor (Neurosciences and Addiction) and Jennifer Kraschnewski (Population Health in Rural Communities). Christopher Chen received the Samuel Hinkle Early Career Research Award, and Michael McDowell received the Innovator to Watch award.

Career Citation Milestone Awards, recognizing faculty whose research has achieved 500 or more citations on a single original research publication, went to Donald Gill, Gavin Graff, Paul Haidet, Richard Legro, Gregory Moore, Lichong Xu, Christopher Siedlecki, Serena Wu and Chad Zack. Investigators whose technology was licensed to industry from April 2025 to March 2026 included Joslyn Kirby, Aron Lukacher, Patricia McLaughlin, Joseph Sassani, Jeffrey M. Sundstrom and Ian Zagon. Investigators who received an issued patent in the same period included Randy Haluck, Sprague W. Hazard, Raymond Hohl, Guohong Li, Jeffrey Neighbors, Charles Palmer, Todd Schell and William Weiss. The celebration will continue later this year, with additional awards to be presented during a September ceremony recognizing partnership and advocacy.

At Stanford Medicine's EPH department, Dr. Michelle Odden received the Outstanding EPH Community Contribution Award for her commitment to fostering belonging, mentorship, and community, including her role as chair of the EPH CARE Committee and her support of students at dissertation defenses and thesis presentations. Bocheng Jing received the same award for organizing social gatherings and a commemorative class T-shirt for graduating students. Rhitishah Yuva Raju received the award for her work as a teaching assistant for EPI 223 and efforts to connect students across CHPR, the School of Medicine, and Epidemiology. Anderson Lu received the Outstanding Student Teaching Award for helping students master epidemiologic methods and research design, including explaining backdoor paths and selection bias using Directed Acyclic Graphs.