Dear Faculty, Staff and Students,
I am pleased to announce that Beata Kosmider, PhD, has been appointed as the new Director of the Center for Inflammation and Lung Research (CILR), effective August 1. Dr. Kosmider earned her PhD at the University of Lodz in Poland, studying platinum-based chemotherapies in lung cancer, and subsequently investigated genetic instability. Dr. Kosmider began her independent career as an Assistant Professor at National Jewish Health in Denver. She joined Katz as an Associate Professor in CILR in 2015, gained tenure in 2021, and was promoted to Full Professor in 2022.
Dr. Kosmider’s research is focused on critical topics in lung health and disease; particularly, on emphysema pathophysiology. Her work includes studying alveolar epithelial cell injury induced by various factors and concentrates on the mechanisms that drive lung repair to identify novel regenerative strategies for pulmonary diseases. Dr. Kosmider has obtained awards from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Department of Defense (DoD) as a Principal Investigator and has a clinical trial funded by a pharmaceutical company. Beyond her research work in CILR, she teaches students in several departments across Katz. As CILR’s Director, she will focus on bolstering the center’s academic excellence through fostering interdisciplinary research collaborations within Katz and across the health system, supporting faculty development and ongoing recruitment of top-tier investigators and overseeing teaching programs for students and postdoctoral fellows. Dr. Kosmider will succeed Dr. Thomas J. Rogers, CILR’s inaugural Director, who has led research at the center for over a decade. Dr. Rogers is a leading expert in the field of inflammation, whose work has made important contributions to the understanding of how chemokine, opioid, and formyl peptide receptors contribute to the regulation of inflammatory responses. Please join me in thanking Dr. Rogers for his invaluable service, and congratulating Dr. Kosmider on her new role. Sincerely, Amy J. Goldberg, MD, FACS The Marjorie Joy Katz Dean Lewis Katz School of Medicine
