Events

An MD-PhD program is more than your MD and PhD curriculum. It allows you to develop friendships with your fellow MD-PhD colleagues and make new contacts within the scientific community.

Annual Retreat

Every year all participants in the MD-PhD Program gather at Wrightsville Beach, NC for a weekend of work and play.  The goal of the retreat is to welcome the incoming students, but it is also an opportunity to discuss "business" items and plan for the new school year. Perhaps the best part of the retreat is the time allocated for R&R before diving back into the work of the new semester; activities including swimming, kayaking, golf, volleyball, jetskiing, tubing, shopping, building sandcastles, relaxing in the sun and sleeping!  Click here to see pictures from past retreats.  An example of a typical weekend agenda can be seen here.

Monday Night Seminars

The program holds Monday night dinner seminars twice per month during the school year which cover clinical and biomedical research topics. The other seminars are given by local scientists and/or physicians invited by the program to discuss cutting-edge research. Most speakers come from UNC or other nearby research centers (Duke and RTP). These are excellent opportunities for junior students to meet faculty members with whom they might consider research rotations and for senior students to review topics outside of their field of expertise. Speakers from the 2009-2010 academic year are listed below:

• Billy Kim, MD: HIF, Hypoxia, and Solid Tumorigenesis
• Nigel Mackman, PhD, FAHA: Role of Tissue Factor in Thrombosis, Inflammation and Cancer
• Doug Graham, MD, PhD (visiting professor and UNC MD/PhD Program Alumnus):
• John Schwartz, MD, (visiting professor and MD/PhD Director, Boston University): Targeting the H+-ATPase to the Apical Plasma Membrane of Intercalated Cells of the Renal Collecting Duct
• Larry Jameson, MD, PhD (visiting professor and UNC MD/PhD Alumnus): Career Advice for Physician Scientists
• Leah Devlin (former NC State Health Director) and Jeff  Engel (current NC State Health Director): Public Health in NC: A Team Sport
• Thomas Kash, PhD: Modulation of Emotional Neural Circuitry: Implications for Alcoholism and Affective Disorders
• Nancy Allbritton, MD, PhD: Microfabricated Arrays for Biomedical Research
• Andrea Neely, MA, PhD: COMT Modulation of Pain Sensitivity: A Bench to Bedside Story
• Oliver Smithies, DPhil: 2007 Nobel Prize Winner
• Kevin Slep, PhD: Regulators of Microtubule Dynamics
• Eliana Perrin, MD, MPH:
• Jonathan Berg, MD, PhD (UNC MD/PhD Program ALUMNUS): Next-generation sequencing for novel gene discovery in families with apparently hereditary cancer susceptibility
• Robert Sandler, MD, MPH: Digestive Disease Epidemiology Research Opportunities
• Nancy Thomas, MD, PhD: Prevention and the Molecular Aspects of Melanoma
• Ron Swanstrom, PhD: HIV Infection of the Brain
• Kim Rathmell, MD, PhD: Translational Research in Renal Cell Carcinoma 

Distinguished Medical Scientist Lecturer

It is the pleasure of the MD-PhD Program to host a nationally recognized physician-scientist each year. This individual gives a lecture to the general medical school community but also spends an extended time with our MD-PhD students.

Past Distinguished Medical Scientist Lecturers:

• Dr. Alan Schwartz, Chairman Pediatrics Washington University
• Dr. Chirstine Seidman, Harvard University
• Dr. Brian Drucker, Oregon Health Sciences
• Dr. Peter Agre, Nobel Laureate, Johns Hopkins
• Dr. Catherine DeAngelis, Editor of JAMA

Alumni Lecturer:

Each year, the program invites back one of its own to share their perspective of life after graduation from the University of North Carolina. In 2010-2011, we had three alumni come back to speak to our students!

Other Opportunities for the MD-PhD program students:

Throughout the year, a number of distinguished individuals visit the UNC School of Medicine. The MD-PHD program staff arranges MD-PhD only events whenever possible. Our students have been able to meet and learn from:

• Dr. Julie Gerberding, Director, Center for Disease Control
• Dr. Ben Carson, Johns Hopkins
• Dr. Victoria Frazier, Washington University, St Louis
• Dr. Griffin Rodgers, Director, National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)
• Dr. Steven Korn, Program Director, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
• Dr. Phillip Greenland, Editor Archives of Internal Medicine
• Dr. Tom Insel, Director, National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
• Eva Mozes Kor, Holocaust Survivor
• Larry Jameson, Executive VP, University of Pennsylvania Health System and Dean of Penn's School of Medicine