Numerous awards for faculty, students from IADR, AADR

School of Dentistry faculty, students and researchers received numerous awards and honors that are normally announced or presented during the joint annual meetings of the International Association for Dental Research (IADR) and the American Association for Dental Research (AADR).

The 2020 General Session and Exhibition, which was to have commemorated the organization’s 100th anniversary in March in Washington, D.C., was canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Interviews and judging required for some of the awards were held online. As each of the award procedures were completed, award recipients were announced on the organizations’ websites or in notification letters to the winners. Following are a compilation of awards and honors received by School of Dentistry faculty, students and researchers.

Faculty member Marco Bottino was one of 20 researchers from around the world who received a newly created award – the IADR Centennial Emerging Leaders Award to recognize young investigators who will lead the research field into the next century. Each of the five IADR international regions selected qualified nominees who are within 10 years of completing their last terminal degree, have demonstrated scientific accomplishment in the field of dental, oral and craniofacial research and have shown outstanding promise for continuing service and leadership within the IADR and the scientific community.

Bottino was one of six researchers selected from the North American Region; 14 other researchers were named from among Africa and Middle East, Asia-Pacific, Latin America and Pan European regions.

“IADR is proud to recognize these exceptional early-career researchers,” said IADR President Paula Moynihan. “These leaders will help guide the next century of discovery and innovation in the field of dental, oral and craniofacial research across the globe.”

Bottino is an associate professor in the Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Endodontics. Bottino joined the U-M School of Dentistry in 2017 from Indiana University, where he was an Associate Professor of Biomedical and Applied Sciences and Graduate Program Director in Dental Biomaterials. His research interests are in the design and synthesis of tissue scaffolds, drug delivery systems, and stem cell therapies to regenerate dental, oral and craniofacial tissues. Bottino received his DDS degree from the Universidade Paulista in São Paulo, Brazil. He earned a master’s degree in nuclear technology from the University of São Paulo’s Institute for Energy and Nuclear Research, and he holds a doctorate in materials science from The University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Marco Bottino

W. Benton Swanson, a joint PhD/DDS student, won first place in the Senior Category of the AADR Edward H. Hatton Award competition for his research, “Rationale Design of Macroporous Tissue Engineering Scaffolds Guides the Fate of the Cranial Suture.” The research involves craniosynostosis, one of the most common congenital birth defects in the U.S. It significantly alters the skull’s ability to expand and grow throughout a child’s development. Along with faculty members and principle investigators Nan Hatch and Yuji Mishina, Swanson is working on developing technologies for diminishing the severity of the disease.

Swanson is entering his fourth year of the PhD program, under the mentorship of Mishina, and is starting the DDS program this summer. The Hatton Award is designed to encourage junior investigators, divided into Junior, Senior and Post-doctoral categories, who exhibit potential for a productive career in dental research. Candidates submit a research abstract, then 27 finalists are asked to submit a longer description of their research. Because the AADR conference was canceled this year, in-person interviews were replaced by video presentations submitted for the judges’ review. First- and second-place awards are given in each of the three categories. First-place winners receive a $1,000 award. This is the fourth consecutive year, and fifth out of the last six, that Hatton winners have come from the U-M dental school.

Another researcher at the Dental School, Nileshkumar Dubey, a postdoc in the Marco Bottino lab, was one of the 27 Hatton finalists.

W. Benton Swanson

Genevieve Romanowicz, a joint DDS/PhD student at the School of Dentistry, received the Women in Science Promising Talent Award from the IADR Women in Science Network.

The award recognizes the dedication and promise of female DDS/DMD, MS/MPH and PhD candidates as well as post-doctoral students in oral, dental and craniofacial research. Romanowicz won in the pre-doctoral category. The network considers the candidate’s past accomplishments, future career plans and abstract of research submitted to the annual session.

Romanowicz received her DDS this spring and is in the final year of the PhD track in the Oral Health Sciences program at the dental school. Her dissertation research focuses on resolving the role of bone collagen cross-linking in mineralization and its effects on mechanical properties. Previous research has shown that collagen cross-links drive a significant portion of the mechanical properties of long bones but remains understudied in craniofacial bones. Her work incorporates in vivo studies to determine the effects of perturbed collagen cross-linking on mineralization and changes in the mechanical properties between bone sites.

Faculty member David Kohn, who is Romanowicz’s mentor, said the award is a testament by the research community outside of U-M to her accomplishments and future potential. “Genny’s research is rigorous and creative, and she is excellent in all academic aspects,” Kohn said. “She is independent, focused, well-organized, and able to manage projects that include significant engineering and biological components.”

Romanowicz said she is applying for post-doctoral positions in the field of bone biomechanics. “My future goal is to obtain an academic position where I can pursue my own independent scientific career to resolve problems pertaining to craniofacial bone diseases and regeneration,” she said. “I hope to maintain my clinical skills by providing general dentistry care and test research questions using clinical trials.”

With the annual IADR conference canceled, Genevieve Romanowicz receives the Women in Science Promising Talent Award from her son Karl, age 6, in a presentation they staged at their home in Canton.

Ligia Schmitd, a PhD candidate in the dental school’s Oral Health Sciences program, won first place in the 2020 AADR Rapid Research 411 competition, sponsored by the National Student Research Group (NSRG).

The NSRG began offering the 411 Rapid Research award in 2019 as an opportunity for pre-doctoral dental students to grow their ability to communicate their science to a non-scientific audience. The 411 name comes from the rules of this oral event: Student competitors have four minutes and one visual slide to explain their research, then the student is asked one question by a judge. Three places are awarded in two categories – Basic Science, which Schmitd entered, and Clinical Science/Public Health. The competition would normally be held at the annual meeting, but was done via video-conferencing this year.

Schmitd’s presentation, “Nerves enhance progression of head and neck cancer,” is research she conducts with her faculty mentor Nisha D’Silva. Schmitd summarized the research this way: “We investigated the hypothesis that nerves in the tumor microenvironment are important drivers of tumor growth and progression. Our results show that nerves enhance proliferation and metastasis of oral cancer both in vitro and in vivo, using gain-of-function and a loss-of-function in vivo models. Data suggest that nerve-derived factors activate Erk and CREB signaling pathways in cancer cells to promote tumor progression.”

Schmitd joined the dental school’s Oral Health Sciences PhD program in 2017 after earning her DDS degree at the University of São Paulo in Brazil. Working with D’Silva, Schmitd is researching how head and neck cancer spreads in the body. It is the sixth most common cancer globally. Despite receiving aggressive therapies, patients have poor survival rates.

Ligia Schmitd

Arwa Daghrery, a PhD candidate in the Oral Health Sciences program, received the IADR/Kulzer Travel Award for 2020. She was the recipient for her research project entitled, “Melt Electrowritten Fluorinated-CaP Coated Poly(ε- caprolactone) Three-Dimensional Scaffolds for Periodontal Regeneration.” Daghrery is a member of the lab of faculty member Marco Bottino.

The award is for investigators who are within five years post-graduation from dental, material science, specialty training or pre-PhD who have submitted an abstract that has a dental materials component. The objective of the award program is to encourage young investigators to undertake research in new or innovative testing methods of dental materials, and to develop new ideas and approaches to improve dental materials. The monetary award support the winners’ attendance at the IADR General Session. Daghrery was the winner in the North American Region; winners in the other four IADR regions are from Austria, Canada, Japan and China.

Arwa Daghrery

A third-year DDS student and two in the DDS/PhD Oral Health Sciences program received AADR Student Fellowships. The three are among only 16 students selected from across the country. The three U-M recipients, research projects, mentors and donors of the financial awards are:

• Alexandra Oklejas (Fourth-year PhD and first-year DDS student) – “TITLE . Faculty mentor: Jacques Nör. Donor: AADR members.
• Claire Stickler (D3) – “Screening for Obstructive Sleep Apnea in Pre-Doctoral Student Clinics.” Faculty mentor: Geoff Gerstner. Donor: P&G Professional Oral Health, Crest Oral + B.
• W. Benton Swanson (Fourth-year PhD and first-year DDS student) – “Bioinspired Polymer Scaffold for Osseous Wound Healing and Periodontal Tissue Engineering.” Faculty mentor: Yuji Mishina. Donor: AADR members.

The dental school’s Office of Research and a faculty committee select students to apply for the fellowship, which was created to encourage dental students living in the United States to consider careers in oral health research. Proposals are sought in basic and clinical research related to oral health. Each proposal is evaluated on its scientific merits in a manner similar to that used for NIDCR grants. Awards are made on the basis of creativity of the project, its feasibility, and its potential significance to oral health research. Upon completion of the research within two years, acceptance of an abstract and presentation at the annual meeting, each recipient is awarded funds for transportation and accommodation expenses to the annual meeting. Recipients are required to present their research at the meeting, by submitting abstracts for poster or oral presentations.

Alexandra Oklejas

Claire Stickler

W. Benton Swanson

Faculty member Dr. Margherita Fontana was among a team of researchers honored as the 2020 recipients of the IADR/AADR William J. Gies Awards for the best papers published in the organizations’ Journal of Dental Research.

Dr. Fontana was among the authors of a paper, “Nonrestorative Treatments for Caries: Systematic Review and Network Meta-analysis,” that won in the Clinic Research Category, one of three categories considered. The IADR/AADR Journal of Dental Research is a multidisciplinary journal dedicated to the dissemination of new knowledge in all sciences relevant to dentistry and the oral cavity and associated structures in health and disease. The award is named for William J. Gies, the journal’s founder.

The IADR is a nonprofit organization with more than 10,000 individual members worldwide, with a mission to drive dental, oral and craniofacial research to advance health and well-being worldwide. The AADR is the largest division of IADR with 3,300 members in the United States.

To learn more, visit www.iadr.org.

Margherita Fontana