Five faculty members at Columbia's medical campus on West 168th Street have been elected to the National Academy of Medicine, the national body that recognizes people for major contributions to health and medicine. The Academy announced its 2026 class of 100 new members on Oct. 19, and Columbia University Irving Medical Center confirmed the same day that five of them come from its Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons.

Who was elected

  • Cory Abate-Shen, PhD, chair of the Department of Molecular Pharmacology and Therapeutics, studies how prostate and bladder cancers begin, spread and become resistant to treatment.
  • Noemie Elhadad, PhD, chair of biomedical informatics and vice dean for AI initiatives, builds artificial intelligence tools for health care, including systems that summarize patient records, and has developed women's health datasets on conditions such as endometriosis.
  • Ali Gharavi, MD, chair of the Department of Medicine and director of the Center for Precision Medicine and Genomics, whose research identified genetic causes of many kidney disorders.
  • Meghan Brooks Lane-Fall, MD, chair of anesthesiology, uses implementation science, the study of how proven practices get adopted in real hospitals, to improve equity in maternal care.
  • Bing Ren, PhD, professor of genetics and development, works in epigenomics, mapping how genes are switched on and off.

What the election means

Columbia describes election to the Academy as one of the highest honors in health and medicine. The 2026 class is made up of 90 regular members and 10 international members, and brings the Academy's total membership to more than 2,600.

The Academy was established in 1970 by the National Academy of Sciences, originally as the Institute of Medicine. Its newly elected members include people from fields outside medicine as well, such as law, engineering and the social sciences.

Five on 168th Street

All five work at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center campus, centered at 630 West 168th Street, in Washington Heights. Their work spans cancer biology, kidney genetics, artificial intelligence, maternal care and the basic science of how genes are regulated.

Getting there

The Columbia University Irving Medical Center campus is at the 168th Street station, served by the A, C and 1 trains. The M2, M3, M4, M5 and M100 buses stop nearby.

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