Department of Nutrition and Integrative Physiology Quarterly Newsletter
Awards and Recognition
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Welcome to the July newsletter, focused on our department's outstanding achievements and accolades. There are too many awards and honors earned by NUIP staff, faculty, and students on an annual basis to include in one newsletter. Read on to see some of the highlights
from this past year.
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| - Teacher of the Year, Anandh Babu Pon Velayutham
- Mentor of the Year, Erik Blackwood
- Julie Metos Special Service,
McKenna Wilson - Outstanding Post-Doctoral Scholar, Stephen Decker
- E. Wayne Askew Award,
Sohom Mookherjee - Preceptor of the Year, Dean Anderson
- Distinguished Alumnus, Lucy Mower
- Exceptional MS Researcher,
Elizabeth Moore - Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher, Mira Hua, Nathan Suitor, and Jack Wilson
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Outstanding Teaching Assistant, Lindsey Taylor and Maren Curtis
- Constance J. Geiger Award,
Leigh Shanor - Volunteer of the Year,
Samhita Chavakula
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College of Health Excellence Awards |
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Micah Drummond won the College of Health Senior Researcher Award, as well as the University Distinguished Mentor Award.
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Mary Morgan won the Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award.
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| Omid Rouzbehani won the Student Researcher Award.
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Katsu Funai was selected to receive the Josie Johnson Memorial Endowed Professorship from the School of Medicine and was also named a Presidential Scholar.
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| Kevin Hicks was selected as the 2026 VPCAT Scholar for Metabolome-Proteome Research.
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- Scott Summers received the 2026 Outstanding Educator Award for Health Sciences Graduate Students from the Academy of Health Science Educators.
- Theresa Dvorak, Amy Reeder, and colleagues from across health sciences received the Academy of Health Science Educators Interprofessional Team Award.
- The Utah Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics recognized Maddie French as the Recognized Young Dietitian of the Year and Mary Morgan as the Outstanding Dietetic Graduate Student.
- Ran Hee Choi was selected as the 2026 Nutrition Obesity Research Centers Scholar.
- Amir H. Aalami was selected for the American Society of Nephrology combined Kidney STAR and TREKS track.
- Elena Yee received an Abstract of Distinction award at the 2026 American Physiological Society Conference in Minneapolis.
- Sohom Mookherjee won the American Heart Association Asian Cardiovascular Symposium's Young Investigator Award and second place for the American Physiological Society Cardiovascular Section's Outstanding Graduate Student award.
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Omid Rouzbehani was named the Wisconsin Stem Cell Graduate Scholar by the University of Wisconsin Madison Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine Center.
- Stephen Decker received the Young Investigator award from the American Society of Matrix Biology.
- Edwin Miranda received the Young Investigator award from the Society for Redox Biology and Medicine.
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Congratulations Class of 2026! |
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NUIP class of 2026 PhD students includes Paul-Emile Bourrant, Sohom Mookherjee,
Precious Opurum, Omid Rouzbehani, and Steven Valdez.
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This year's Coordinated Master's Program in Dietetics graduates includes Craig Busch,
Elizabeth Moore, Catherine Valeo, Jadyn Campbell, Maren Curtis, Leigh Shanor,
Mackenzie Delgado, Madison Kaneko, Kara Pastorik, Hannah Doherty, Mary Morgan,
Kamryn Shapiro, Vanessa Gonzalez Churchill, Emily Medina, Noah Johnson, Julie Kavas, and Jessica Laures.
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Sohom Mookherjee delivered the graduate student speech in a moving address
at the College of Health convocation ceremony.
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Thunder Jalili was interviewed by Utah Public Radio about Utah's supplement industry.
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Theresa Dvorak contributed to the School of Medicine's RealMD podcast, discussing how to build high functioning interprofessional teams.
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| Maddie French was featured in a UHealth Instagram reel about bell peppers in celebration of nutrition month.
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Jim Martin discussed the science behind pedaling techniques and pedaling efficiency on the MyVeloFit podcast.
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| Steven Valdez received the 2026 BioHive Graduate Student of the Year award and was featured in a short film.
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| Kirea Snell wrote an article on Fibermaxxing for the University of Utah Health HealthFeed Blog.
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Welcome New Research Faculty! |
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Courtney Choy, PhD, MPH, joined our faculty earlier this month from the island of Oahu, Hawaiʻi. Her research focuses on childhood growth and development, chronic disease prevention, epidemiology, public health, implementation science and family health promotion, with a particular emphasis on addressing obesity and cardiometabolic disease risk in Samoa. She received her MPH at Yale, and her PhD at Brown. Her work has been supported by the U.S. Fulbright Program and National Institutes of Health. Guided by a commitment to meaningful impact and sustainable change, she works with communities to build research capacity and strengthen health systems in the Pacific Islands and beyond. At the U, she will continue to translate research findings into practical public health programs and policies.
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Stay in Touch with NUIP on Social Media |
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383 Colorow Drive #4 | Salt Lake City, UT 84108 US
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