SleepTalker August 2021

James P. Dilger, PhD

   We welcome Dr. Shao-Jun Tang as the newest member of our basic research faculty. In addition to directing his research program, Dr. Tang will serve as Vice Chair for Research and as the Inaugural Director of The Stony Brook University Pain and Analgesia Research Center (SPARC).

   Dr. Tang did his undergraduate studies at the University of Hunan Science and Technology. He then moved to The University of Toronto for his M.Sc and Ph.D. degrees from the Department of Molecular and Medical Genetics. From 1998 - 2001, he was a HHMI Postdoctoral Associate in the Division of Biology at Caltech. In 2001, he was appointed Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at Caltech. Dr. Tang then moved to the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston where he moved through the academic ranks in the Department of Neuroscience and Cell Biology. In that department, he served as Director of the Graduate Program and Vice Chair for Research. From 2018 until his appointment at Stony Brook, he held the title of Distinguished Professor.

   Dr. Tang has directed a highly productive research program, having secured grants from the NIH and other foundations. He has authored over 60 peer-reviewed publications and invited reviews. He has presented lectures in the US, Canada, China, and Europe.

   HIV-1 infection causes profound detrimental effects in the nervous systems and lead to various neurological and mental disorders, collectively called NeuroAIDS. The research in Dr. Tang's lab is centered on the pathogenic mechanism of NeuroAIDS, with a current focus on pain disorders. They want to understand how HIV-1, antiretroviral therapy and other comorbidities (e.g. use of opioids) cause neuronal and glial damages in the pain neural circuits and use the new understanding to develop therapeutic approaches to intervene the disease processes. They use interdisciplinary approaches of molecular biology, mouse genetics, imaging, single cell analysis, electrophysiology, and behavioral analysis to tackle the problems.

   The Stony Brook University Pain and Analgesia Research Center (SPARC) has been established to provide a platform that facilitates collaboration in basic and translational pain and analgesia research. As the inaugural Director, Dr. Tang will lead the activity to stimulate collaborative studies among SPARC investigators and with outside investigators in relevant fields.

   We are pleased to welcome Dr. Shao-Jun Tang to our department!

Patient comment about our Ambulatory Surgery Center staff from the Press Ganey questionnaires (compiled by Marisa Barone-Citrano, MA)

   Dr. Sherwin Park – Excellent very thorough & professional

   Dr. Andrea Voutsas was very thorough and repeatedly returned to check on me

James P. Dilger, PhD

   The 2021 Peter Glass Academic Research Evening takes place on Tuesday, August 31 from 3:30 pm to 8:30 pm. It is being held in the MART Building.

   We are delighted to welcome Dr. Pamela Flood, MD as the Keynote Speaker for this Academic Research Evening. Dr. Flood is Professor of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Stanford University. Dr. Flood spent the first part of her medical and scientific career at Columbia University, obtaining her MD there in 1990. She went on to do her internship and Anesthesiology Residency there and completed a Fellowship in Obstetric ​Anesthesiology in 1996. Concurrent with the fellowship, she received a MS in Neuroscience. She progressed from Assistant Professor to Associate Professor to Full Professor in Columbia's Department of Anesthesiology. In 2011, she moved to California where she worked at UCSF for two years and then became Professor Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine at Stanford. Somehow, she found the time to do a Fellowship in Pain Medicine at Stanford.

   Much of Dr. Flood's research focused on the role of neuronal nicotinic receptors in anesthesia and analgesia. Evidence for the importance of nicotine in analgesia has waxed and waned. In a 2014 review (PMID: 25046780), Dr. Flood wrote "while nicotine is not useful in the perioperative period, subtype-selective nicotinic modulators continue to offer potential promise to the armamentarium against acute and chronic pain". Anesthesia care during labor and delivery is another one of her research interests. And most recently, she has been interested in responses to the opioid crisis.

   Dr. Flood has visited Stony Brook several times in the past, including an informal visit to my lab in the early 1990s. We look forward to her keynote address "Is a dural puncture benign and self-limited?”

Srinivas Pentyala, PhD

   It is with great pleasure that I inform you that we successfully organized the 17th Annual Science And Research Awareness Series (SARAS) at Stony Brook Medical Center from July 5-23, 2021 as an In-person event. Prior to last summer, up to 130 students from all over the country (and some international students) attended the 3-week SARAS. We took a break in 2020 after 16 years due to COVID lockdown. This year, we followed all mandated CDC, NY State, Stony Brook University/Medical School/Hospital COVID-19 guidelines, and every possible precaution was taken to organize an In-person SARAS (also had contact tracing mechanism in place). This year, as we could not provide on-campus housing nor chaperoned LIRR commuter students on campus, students commuted by road. Most of the 60 students were from Suffolk and Nassau counties but there were a few from Queens, Brooklyn and Manhattan. Several students hailed from NJ, Virginia, Texas and California and stayed in local hotels to attend SARAS. We had students who are fully vaccinated, some who tested positive 3 months before the program started, and some who were not vaccinated. We divided the students into cohorts and successfully completed the program. As far as we know, our SARAS was the only In-person STEM (biomedical) summer program that was organized in the country this year. Thanks to the enthusiastic support from our colleagues, we were able to hold SARAS in these challenging times. SARAS event details, schedule, photos, videos, etc. can be found at https://sites.google.com/a/stonybrook.edu/saras/.

  SARAS-2021 was featured in Stony Brook News.

• Abola RE, Schwartz J, Beg T, Gan TJ, Forrester J. In Response (A Practical Guide for Anesthesia Providers on the Management of COVID-19 Patients in the Acute Care Hospital). Anesth Analg. 2021 Aug 1;133(2):e30-e31
• Winebrenner H, Gelfand H, Roman-Banegas L, Angelo T, Jabaut JM. A Case Report of the Anesthetic Management of a Parturient With Congenital Hypofibrinogenemia and Complete Placenta Previa. A A Pract. 2021 Mar 24;15(3):e01426
• Hankerd K, McDonough KE, Wang J, Tang SJ, Chung JM, La JH. Postinjury stimulation triggers a transition to nociplastic pain in mice. Pain. 2021 Jun 14

James P. Dilger, PhD