Three recognized for Faculty Excellence
Bhatnagar, Bolli, Holthouser honored by university administration
President James Ramsey, Provost Shirley Willihnganz and other administrators recognized distinguished faculty at the annual Celebration of Faculty Excellence Dec. 6 at the Brown & Williamson Club at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium.
Those recognized from the University of Louisville Department of Medicine include:
► Aruni Bhatnagar holds the Smith and Lucille Gibson Chair in
Medicine. He is a professor of medicine in the Department of Medicine.
Bhatanagar also is the director of the Diabetes and Obesity Center where he leads an interdisciplinary team of investigators in studying how diabetes and obesity affect cardiovascular health and disease.
Several NIH grants support his research. Bhatnagar has published 140 peer-reviewed manuscripts, 25 book chapters and reviews and more than 200 abstracts.
He is a past recipient of the President’s Distinguished Faculty Award for Research in the Basic and Applied Sciences.
► Roberto Bolli is chief of the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, director of the Institute of Molecular Cardiology and executive vice chair of the Department of Medicine.
He has built an internationally acclaimed research program that is regarded as one of the top programs in the world. Since 1995, his team has received more than $150 million in NIH grants.
In November, he published in The Lancet the first in-human study of using a person’s own cardiac stem cells to treat him for heart failure. The results are more promising than the team expected and this new treatment could revolutionize cardiology.
Bolli has published 337 papers and has made many fundamental contributions to both the understanding of cardioprotection and the use of adult stem cells for cardiac repair.
► Amy Holthouser is an assistant professor with appointments in the Office of Medical Education and in the Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics.
She joined the faculty immediately upon completion of her residency, and has developed an extraordinary track record in teaching, mentorship, educational leadership and research.
Of her approach to teaching, she said: "I show students that the innate curiosity they came into medical school with is an essential learning tool feeding their spirit and how to keep it alive. I provide students with the mentoring and purposeful context to transform medical education from a passive trial of endurance into an adventure they can enjoy as it nourishes them from the inside out."
