Features

Faces, mirrors and pills

Science Over Stigma

By probing the physical cause of obesity, researchers have repudiated harmful misconceptions, leading to new, highly effective medications.
Birds overlaid on spectrograms

The Sounds of Science

How insights from ornithology, coupled with advances in AI, could enable doctors to screen for disease using the human voice.

Bones’ Secret Cells

Research led by Dr. Matthew Greenblatt and his lab is revealing connections between bone stem cells and a surprising array of conditions — including cancer.

Also in This Issue

Feet on unbalanced scale
Dr. Erica Phillips and Dr. Yazmin Carrasco

Alumni

Dr. Meera Mani]

“We invest in entrepreneurs who are championing innovative clinical and health-care delivery models, and where we believe that they can translate those ideas into high-growth businesses.” Dr. Meera Mani (M.D. ’09, Ph.D. ’08)

Alumni Section

From the Dean

Dr. Robert A. Harrington

Weill Cornell Medicine’s tripartite mission is to provide exceptional care, drive groundbreaking discoveries and teach the health-care leaders of tomorrow. Woven into the fabric of our mission lies a vital fourth pillar: community.

Here, we believe in community’s transformative power: It is foundational to who we are as an institution. Every patient we treat, student we teach, health-care professional on our team and individual who benefits from our research is a member of our wide-reaching and vibrant community.

Yet when we look at the diverse communities we serve locally and globally, we know that factors like structural racism and access to care inform and influence health outcomes. So to address these disparities, we continue to evolve and deepen how we understand the role of community in everything we do.  

Weill Cornell Medicine investigators are leaders in scrutinizing the very practices and models that medicine has traditionally used to understand health disparities — and to improve them. We are creating comprehensive, strategic programs to enact change, such as initiatives to diminish cancer-related health inequities in impoverished neighborhoods, including by expanding the pipeline of future STEM experts to ensure that diverse communities are represented in scientific discovery and health care.

We are also proud of our role in the global community and deeply aware of our social responsibility to it. Our international research programs, such as in Haiti, have impact far and wide, and our clinical efforts — like our work to build a thriving academic medical center in Tanzania — are prime examples of how we can grow and strengthen academic medicine in communities that need it most.

To best serve the communities around us, we must also look within. We must overcome our unconscious biases because our dedication to diversity, equity, inclusion, justice and belonging is fundamental to our identity. By embracing and celebrating our differences, we ensure that every member of our community not only feels valued, but empowered to help those we serve. As we join forces, I am optimistic that we will grow stronger and change medicine so that it serves all who need it.

Robert A. Harrington, M.D.
Stephen and Suzanne Weiss Dean, Weill Cornell Medicine 
Provost for Medical Affairs, Cornell University

Portrait: Sam Kerr

Summer 2024 Front to Back

  • Features

    Science Over Stigma

    By probing the physical cause of obesity, researchers have repudiated harmful misconceptions, leading to new, highly effective medications.
  • Features

    The Sounds of Science

    How insights from ornithology, coupled with advances in AI, could enable doctors to screen for disease using the human voice.
  • Features

    Bones’ Secret Cells

    Research led by Dr. Matthew Greenblatt and his lab is revealing connections between bone stem cells and a surprising array of conditions — including cancer.
  • Notable

    Expansion in Midtown

    A 216,000 square-foot expansion of clinical and research programs at 575 Lexington Ave. will provide state-of-the-art clinical care at the Midtown Manhattan location.
  • Notable

    A Dramatic Growth in Research

    In the decade since the Belfer Research Building’s opening, Weill Cornell Medicine’s sponsored research funding has more than doubled.
  • Notable

    Dateline

    Heart disease presents differently in resource-poor countries like Haiti. Dr. Molly McNairy and colleagues are working to identify underlying causes and prevention.
  • Notable

    Overheard

    Weill Cornell Medicine faculty members are leading the conversation about important health issues across the country and around the world.
  • Notable

    News Briefs

    Notable faculty appointments, honors, awards and more — from around campus and beyond.
  • Grand Rounds

    Living With Endometriosis: A 12-Year Journey

    How the right treatment reduced the pain of endometriosis
  • Grand Rounds

    Taking Action Against Lung Cancer

    Monitoring by Weill Cornell Medicine’s Incidental Lung Nodule Surveillance Program can lead to early cancer detection.
  • Grand Rounds

    News Briefs

    The latest on teaching, learning and patient-centered care.
  • Discovery

    Gut Check

    New evidence shows that a bacterium found in the gut of livestock could be a trigger of multiple sclerosis in humans.
  • Discovery

    Researchers Chart the Contents of Human Bone Marrow

    A new method for mapping the location and spatial features of blood-forming cells within human bone marrow provide a powerful new means to study diseases that affect it.
  • Discovery

    Findings

    The latest advances in faculty research, published in the world’s leading journals.
  • Alumni

    Profiles

    Forging critical connections to move research from the bench to the bedside, our alumni are making an impact.
  • Alumni

    Notes

    What’s new with you? Keep your classmates up to date on all your latest achievements with an Alumni Note.
  • Alumni

    In Memoriam

    Marking the passing of our faculty and alumni.
  • Alumni

    Moments

    Marking celebratory events in the lives of our students, including the White Coat Ceremony and receptions for new students.
  • Second Opinion

    Equal Risk

    Does race have a role in calculations of health risks?
  • Exchange

    Health Equity

    Two faculty members discuss the importance of community-engaged research in their work to help combat cancer disparities fueled by persistent poverty.
  • Muse

    Finding Strength in Art

    Surin Lee is a Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar medical student, Class of 2026, and a visual artist.
  • Spotlight

    Partners in Solving Surgical Challenges

    Dr. Darren Orbach (M.D. ’98, Ph.D.) and Dr. Peter Weinstock (M.D. ’98, Ph.D.) are pioneering the use of practice simulations to ensure successful complex surgeries.