M Dentistry - Fall 2023

For the University of Michigan School of Dentistry Community | Fall 2023

New Dean Jacques Nör Advancing the school with a focus on its tradition of excellence and leadership in dentistry

Dear Alumni and Friends, Since beginning my appointment as Dean in August, I have been steadily meeting more and more members of this large community of people we call the University of Michigan School of Dentistry. I have a long way to go as we have more than 10,000 alumni around Michigan, the country and the world. Wherever I go and whomever I meet, one thing is clear: Members of this community are proud and

Dean’s Message

supportive of our school’s history of excellence.

Over the last 148 years, our school has been recognized around the world as a leader in dentistry, dental education and oral health sciences. I have been entrusted with the incredible honor of leading this impressive school and I am grateful for the opportunity. Our success moving forward depends on our entire community – faculty, students, staff, alumni and friends – working as a team to face our challenges and opportunities together.

Even as we are acknowledged among the “Leaders and Best” in dental education, we must continue to advance and strengthen our mission of excellent patient care and groundbreaking research rather than be content with the status quo. The best way to do this is to gather input from all of the school’s constituencies about how we can improve every aspect of our many and diverse responsibilities.

I have identified a few areas to start working on (see related story on Page 2). I firmly believe that we are much stronger and will be more successful if we operate in a culture of collaboration.

My commitment is to further the high standards of clinical and research leadership that have been embedded in the fabric of the school for nearly a century and a half. Excellence is achieved when we invest in people and work together towards a shared goal. I encourage our alumni to remain engaged with us here at the school as we strive each day to move forward and gather different perspectives for navigating the continual challenges of taking a world-class School of Dentistry to even higher ground.

Sincerely,

Jacques Nör, Dean Donald A. Kerr Collegiate Professor of Dentistry

In this Issue Fall 2023

Volume 39, Number 2

M Dentistry is published twice a year for alumni, students, faculty, staff and friends of the School of Dentistry. See the school website at www.dent.umich.edu for more news and features.

Dean............................................................................. …Jacques Nör Director of Marketing & Communications..................Raymond Aldrich Writer/Editor.................................................................... Lynn Monson Graphic Designer ................................................................ Ken Rieger Photographers..................................Mary Lewandowski, Ken Rieger, Lynn Monson, Leisa Thompson, Celia Alcumbrack University of Michigan School of Dentistry Alumni Society Board of Governors: Terms Expire Fall 2024: Michael Behnan, MS ‘79, Rochester Hills, Mich.

Theresa Hull, BSDH ‘11, Ann Arbor, Mich.

Sara Kellogg, DDS ‘07, Saline, Mich.

Amin Jaffer, DDS ’97, Ann Arbor, Mich.

Mona Riaz, BSDH ’12, MS ‘20, Farmington Hills, Mich.

Riley Schaff, DDS ’17, Ann Arbor, Mich.

Terms Expire Fall 2025: Janice Pilon, DDS ’93, Hanover, N.H. Debra Lisull, DH Cert ' 74, BSDH '79, DDS '83, Ann Arbor, Mich.

Julie Thomas, DDS '89, Ann Arbor, Mich.

Chair: Allan Padbury, Jr, DDS '99, MS '02 MS, Jackson, Mich.

Jennifer Cullen, BSDH '12, Ypsilanti, Mich.

Brittany Forga, BSDH '10, Van Buren Township, Mich.

Terms Expire Fall 2026: Jake DeSnyder, DDS '67, Plattsburgh, N.Y. William Mason, DDS '81, MS '84, Saginaw, Mich.

Michael Palaszek, DDS '82, Grand Rapids, Mich.

Scott Szotko, DDS ‘99, La Jolla, Calif.

Elizabeth Milewski, ‘15 BSDH, Ionia, Mich.

Christine Farrell, ‘81 BSDH, Lansing, Mich.

Ex Officio Members: Jacques Nör, Dean Carrie Towns, Chief Development Officer, Alumni Relations and Development The Regents of the University: Jordan A. Acker, Michael J. Behm, Mark J. Bernstein, Paul W. Brown, Sarah Hubbard, Denise Ilitch, Ron Weiser, Katherine E. White, Santa J. Ono (ex officio)

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SCHOOL

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FACULTY

18

RESEARCH

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DENTAL HYGIENE

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STUDENTS

Send comments and updates to: dentistry.communications@umich.edu or Communications, School of Dentistry, 1011 N. University Ave., Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1078 The University of Michigan, as an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer, complies with all applicable federal and state laws regarding nondiscrimination and affirmative action. The University of Michigan is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all persons and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, disability, religion, height, weight, or veteran status in employment, educational programs and activities, and admissions. Inquiries or complaints may be addressed to the Senior Director for Institutional Equity, and Title IX/Section 504/ADA Coordinator, Office of Institutional Equity, 2072 Administrative Services Building, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1432, (734) 763-0235, TTY (734) 647-1388. For other University of Michigan information call (734) 764-1817. © 2023 Regents of the University of Michigan

ALUMNI

FEATURES

The School’s New Leader

Jacques Nör brings a wide-ranging diversity of experience to role of Dean Dr. Jacques Nör’s time at the University of Michigan School of Dentistry has been a steady progression since he first arrived as a graduate student in 1992.

He came to U-M after seven years as a general practice dentist in his native Brazil.

He expected that he would return to his thriving practice there, but instead his career path stayed on track at the School of Dentistry.

The abridged summary of this three decades at the school: • Master’s degree in pediatric dentistry.

• PhD in Oral Health Sciences.

• Clinical instructor.

• Assistant, associate and full professor teaching in both predoctoral and graduate courses.

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• U-M faculty appointments in biomedical engineering and otolaryngology.

• A published and award-winning research scientist in cancer biology and dental tissue regeneration, with 20-plus years of continuous funding from the National Institutes of Health.

• Chair of the Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Endodontics Department.

• Numerous other examples of leadership and mentorship at many levels, from the dental school and university to national and international professional associations.

With that background as a foundation, Nör added a new appointment in August – as the school’s 15th dean since it was founded in 1875.

After a comprehensive national search that produced five finalists, Nör was

recommended for the position in June by U-M Provost Laurie McCauley, the dental school’s previous dean, with approval of the university’s Board of Regents. His renewable 5-year term began Aug. 1.

Nör discussed his gratitude for the appointment when he delivered the school’s annual State of the School presentation in late October. “When I arrived here 31 years ago as a graduate student in pediatric dentistry, I would never have imagined that I would have this honor to serve as the dean of our school,” Nör told faculty and staff gathered in Kellogg Auditorium. “I appreciate your support and your trust. I’ll do my very best to deserve your trust and to deserve this honor of serving as dean.”

Provost McCauley cited Nör’s breadth of academic excellence in announcing his selection. “Dr. Nör is an accomplished

Left: DDS students listen as Dean Jacques Nör shares pointers about a procedure in a Sim Lab session earlier this fall. Nör will continue to teach, though on a more limited basis, in his new role as dean.

scholar in the best Michigan tradition,” she said. “As an internationally recognized and award-winning researcher with an extensive teaching portfolio, Dr. Nör has distinguished himself along multiple dimensions of our university’s core mission. His demonstrated commitments as a clinician-scientist and academic leader hold great promise for his impact on the School of Dentistry.”

In presentations and interviews since his appointment, Nör has described his interest in the dean position as a way of sharing his gratitude and paying back the School of Dentistry for its support and the professional advancements it made possible.

“I am fully committed to make the best I can of this opportunity and really make an impact on student education, patient care and research here,” he said. “This is not for my own ego. This is because I got so much from this school and I had so many opportunities.

To be a faculty member at this school is such a privilege. This is a way to pay back and really try to do the best that I can. But I know that I cannot do it alone. I’m going to need a lot of help from everybody here to make it work.”

Faculty member Dr. Peter Polverini, the Jonathan Taft Distinguished University Professor of Dentistry, understands the wide-ranging demands of being dean because he held the post from 2003-13, after serving three years in the same role at the University of Minnesota. Polverini has been a mentor for Nör for nearly 30 years, starting when Nör worked in Polverini’s lab as a PhD student and continuing as Nör moved through various positions at the school. Polverini said the new dean’s intellect, personality and commitment are well-suited for the job.

“He’s great to work with, a very collaborative sort of guy,” Polverini said. “For me, it was just great having him in the laboratory.

His demeanor was excellent, he worked hard. He’s somebody who was not easily flustered and I think that’s good for his new job because certainly there will be many instances where decisions will be difficult.

You know where he stands on any one issue, there’s nothing hidden. He makes it very clear, but he does it in a way that is both direct but polite, and I think that’s important for that position.”

Another important aspect of Nör’s background, Polverini said, is its breadth, starting as a general dentist who eventually specialized in pediatric dentistry, then moved into clinical teaching and expanded his career into scientific research. He said Nör can draw on all those experiences as he navigates the wide-ranging needs of the school.

“As dean, sometimes you have to go from experience and your gut feeling,” Polverini said. “He’s going to be dealing with people who are like-minded with him and with those on the other side of the spectrum.

He has been in the trenches as a practicing dentist. He’s gone through the gauntlet in the academic environment and risen through the ranks. So I think he sees all aspects of what it takes to be successful, not only as an individual faculty member but also as a dean.”

Advancing tradition Already recognized as one of the top dental schools in the world, the School of Dentistry

must continue to call on its tradition of leadership and excellence to shape dentistry and dental education in coming decades, Nör said. There are many challenges and opportunities ahead as the profession undergoes rapid change in areas such as digital dentistry, learning health systems and regenerative dentistry, to name a few.

“The future is full of promise for improving dental education and clinical care,” he said.

“Our commitment is to turn out the bestprepared dental and dental hygiene graduates in America while breaking new ground in scientific research into prevention of dental disease, along with advances in restorative/ regenerative dentistry, cancer therapeutics and other oral health areas.”

In his State of the School presentation, Nör noted that his tenure as dean is beginning at a time of revitalization for the school. The disruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic have largely faded away, and the school’s now-completed Blue Renew renovation and expansion project has created an inviting and innovative new workspace with updated, state-of-the-art equipment. “Now it is time to refocus our efforts and make a commitment as a community to support each other, to help each other, to stay together,” Nör said.

With that emphasis on teamwork and collaboration, Nör is identifying areas of emphasis among the wide-reaching and complex responsibilities of the school.

Among his early priorities: • Improve the recruitment of patients by revamping the process of patient Continued

In this 2013 file photo, Jacques Nör and his longtime mentor, Peter Polverini discuss research in a dental school lab.

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The School’s New Leader (Continued)

admission to reduce wait lists and provide faster turnaround for appointment requests, particularly for emergencies and routine first visits for predoctoral students. Design marketing to reinforce that the dental school provides world-class dental care.

• Continue to advance the school’s strong and longstanding commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion.

• Continually enhance the quality of clinical experiences in the predoctoral curriculum. Improve discipline-focused and interdisciplinary calibration of preclinical and clinical faculty. Expand digital dentistry, 3-D printing and in-house CAD/CAM services in predoc clinics, including same-day delivery using in-house manufacturing.

To advance all of the school’s operations and initiatives, Nör emphasizes that “excellence is achieved when we invest in people and work together toward a shared goal.” He is an adherent of the “Servant Leadership” philosophy promoted by Robert Greenleaf, an author and thought leader in organizational management in the 1960s and ’70s.

The concept advocates that leaders should focus on the growth and well-being of people and the communities to which they belong, in effect becoming servants to the organization, its members and their needs, which in turn strengthens the organization.

• Recruit and retain outstanding faculty at a time when the national trend is an increase in faculty openings at dental schools.

Provide excellent start-up packages and lab space, and a commitment for faculty to have protected time for research.

• Support the well-being, professional development and retention of staff.

• Contribute to the evolving research into Learning Health Systems that systematically capture and analyze data on patient conditions, treatment and outcomes as the ultimate, evidence-based way of improving patient care.

• Explore innovative ways to increase the school’s student scholarship program to help reduce student debt.

Nör said the dental school is a diverse community of people that he plans to celebrate and support with a culture of collaboration, collegiality and helpfulness based on empathy and respect. He said integrity, professionalism and accountability ensure ethical decision-making, while transparent communication strengthens relationships. Problem-solving and discussions of

priorities must challenge existing knowledge, which in turn fosters discovery.

Career path origins Dean Nör’s interest in dentistry traces to his childhood in Porto Alegre, a city of more than 4 million in the state of Rio Grande do Sul in the far south of Brazil.

Jacques Nör’s Career Highlights Education • DDS, 1985, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Porto Alegre, Brazil • Pediatric dentistry certificate, 1990, UFRGS • MS pediatric dentistry, 1994, University of Michigan School of Dentistry • PhD oral health sciences, 1999, University of Michigan School of Dentistry • Post-doctoral fellowship in cancer cell biology, 2001, University of Michigan Medical School • Sabbatical in Intravital imaging, 2014, Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands

Academic appointments • 1994-95: Clinical instructor, U-M Dept. of Orthodontics and Pediatric Dentistry (OPD) • 1995-99: Adjunct lecturer, U-M OPD • 1999-2003: Assistant professor, U-M Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Endodontics (CRSE) 4

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• 2003-06: Associate professor with tenure, U-M CRSE; and associate professor of Biomedical Engineering, U-M College of Engineering

• 2019-20: Chair, Section on Dentistry & Oral Health Sciences (Section R), American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

• 2006-present: Professor of Dentistry, U-M CRSE

• 2017: Named Fellow, AADR

• 2006-21: Professor of Biomedical Engineering, U-M College of Engineering

• 2013: Named Fellow, AAAS

• 2009-present: Professor of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery, U-M Medical School • 2011-present: Donald A. Kerr Collegiate Professor of Dentistry

• 2012 Distinguished Scientist Award, IADR • 2012-13: President, Pulp Biology and Regeneration Group, IADR

• 2015-2023: Chair, U-M CRSE

• 2011-16: Co-director of the U-M Head and Neck Cancer Specialized Program of Research Excellence funded by the National Cancer Institute (NCI)

• Aug. 1, 2023: Started 5-year term as Dean, U-M School of Dentistry

• 2010-present: Associated Editor, Journal of Dental Research (JDR)

Selected leadership positions and awards

• 2010 and 2011: William J. Gies Awards for Biological Research

• 2023-24 President, Stem Cell Biology Group, International Association for Dental Research (IADR)

• 2001: New Dentist-Scientist Award, American Dental Association Health Foundation

• 2021-22, President, American Association for Dental, Oral and Craniofacial Research (AADOCR)

• 1999: Hatton Award (1st place) for research from both the IADR and AADR

Left: Dean Jacques Nör gives an overview of the dental school’s financial model during his State of the School address for the dental school community at Kellogg Auditorium in October. but at U-M he encountered another aspect of dentistry and higher education that appealed to him – scientific research. As he worked on his master’s thesis with his faculty mentor Dr. Robert Feigal, he tackled a problem that he had encountered in his dental practice.

Bonding materials and methods at that time were inferior, often failing after a relatively short period of time. Nör’s master’s research into bonding composite resins to tooth structure was published in the Journal of Dental Research and Pediatric Dentistry.

Neither of his parents went beyond elementary education, but they understood the value of higher education and believed it was the best inheritance they could leave Jacques and his two older siblings, a brother and sister.

Their mother was a homemaker and their father demonstrated his work ethic during 37 years as the sacristan of a Lutheran church.

The family lived next to the church, so as a child Jacques frequently played there. From an early age he remembers feeling empathy for other people and that perhaps his calling was to serve others. Instead of becoming a pastor like his brother, however, he considered dentistry. His maternal grandfather, who died before Jacques was born, had been a dentist. And a cousin was in dental school when Jacques was in high school deciding on a career. When Jacques visited his cousin at dental school, he liked what he saw and decided to follow that path. “Being able to help people in pain was something that appealed to me,” he remembers.

In Brazil, students go directly from high school to dental school. By the time Jacques was in dental school at the branch of Federal University in his hometown, his cousin was in practice, providing a second place to learn about dentistry. On weekends and during summers, Jacques would be at the practice, learning how to make temporaries and dentures in the lab, among other procedures.

“I owe my cousin a lot,” he says.

The new Dr. Nör finished dental school at age 21 and opened his practice at age 22 in

Taquara, a city of about 55,000 people near Porto Alegre. The practice grew steadily from 1986 to 1992, allowing Nör to add an associate as the patient base eventually reached 4,000 people. It was a highly successful practice and Nör enjoyed it, but after several years he decided to make a change. “Because I graduated from dental school so early, at some point I realized it was going to be a long, long journey doing the same routine,” he said. “I decided it was the right time to specialize. Even though I was doing general dentistry, I was seeing lots of children in my practice and enjoyed that part of it, so I decided to apply to pediatric dentistry programs in the U.S.” In 1990, Nör interviewed at four U.S. dental schools, including U-M where Dr. Paul Loos was then the director of the pediatric dentistry program. Loos offered Nör a spot in the program and he spent the next two years earning his master’s degree. It was a heady time for the young dentist from Brazil, who was meeting and learning from U-M faculty members who had written some of the textbooks he had used in dental school.

Nör had expected he would return to Brazil to practice in his newly acquired specialty,

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Faculty member Dr. James McNamara took notice of Nör’s academic and research interests and encouraged him to apply for a new degree program that the dental school was starting the next year – the PhD in Oral Health Sciences. The advance notice allowed Nör to reconsider his initial plan to return to Brazil after earning his MS. He decided the PhD program was too good of an opportunity to pass up and he was accepted, becoming one of four students in the first cohort of the program, now in its 29th year.

Expanding into research Over the four and a half years Nör worked on his PhD, he was part of the Peter Polverini lab investigating the mechanisms of cancer biology. The high level of the lab’s research, plus the importance of advancing the scientific understanding of such a deadly disease, marked a turning point for Nör. He realized that research would need to be part of his career track. After completing his PhD, he completed a post-doctoral fellowship in cancer cell biology at Michigan Medicine with Dr. Gabriel Nunez, a leading researcher in the fields of cancer cell apoptosis and Crohn’s Disease, which causes chronic intestinal inflammation.

Like working with Polverini, working as a post-doc reinforced the importance of linking research and clinical care as Nunez broke ground in understanding Crohn’s.

“The laboratory was buzzing. It was a really exciting place to work,” Nör said. “That was critical to me about the time I was starting as a faculty member at the dental Continued

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The School’s New Leader (Continued)

Faculty members Purnima Kumar (right) and Livia Tenuta talk with Dean Nör at a reception following his State of the School address in October. school, to see how impactful research can improve people’s lives.”

As Nör made his dental school ascent from instructor and adjunct up through the professor ranks, he carved out his own niche in cancer research by focusing on salivary gland cancer. He added a second emphasis on dental pulp tissue regeneration. Both areas include a focus on the varied roles of stem cells – harmful in cancer and beneficial in regeneration. Over the years, his research in both areas was published in significant journals and he earned major grants from various sources. Nör’s lab has received funding from many sources, but perhaps the best indication of the quality and impact of his research is the fact that his laboratory has been continuously funded by National Institutes of Health for the last 20 years.

Even as his research footprint at the dental school expanded and the number of research grants and awards increased, Nör continued both his didactic and clinical teaching duties.

He doesn’t agree with the school of thought that an academic should be either a researcher or a clinician. “Early on, clinical dentistry was always the most important thing for me.

That was what I was trained for and I really enjoyed doing it,” he said. “But as I got into research, I also enjoyed that challenge and realized it is critical for improving clinical 6

FEATURES M Dentistry | Fall 2023

care. I think that you can absolutely do both. Being a clinician helps in our research because it gives purpose to our work. We understand clinically where the problems are, and then, as a researcher, you have the opportunity to try to solve those problems.

The relationship between the clinic and the research has to be there to make the research impactful in improving oral health and the survival of patients with cancer.”

The importance of leadership The U-M dental school’s high standing and influence in the profession of dentistry was experienced by Nör in 2012 when he was asked by U-M Provost Philip Hanlon to chair the search committee for a new dean as Peter Polverini completed his second term.

During the process that eventually named Laurie McCauley as Dean in 2013, Nör said his interaction with the school community at large, the search committee and the Provost’s Office was an enlightening experience.

“That was the time when I realized the dean has the opportunity to make lasting and impactful changes to the profession,” Nör said. “The dentistry world looks to Michigan.

Being the dean of this school, if you make changes here that are positive and that are successful, it has a downstream impact throughout all the world. I’ve been so many

other places in the world that I know for a fact that things that happen here will impact other schools and indirectly affect the lives of countless people throughout the world.

In my short time as dean, already I’ve had contact from another country looking for help with their curriculum because they want to create a new dental school there. There’s a reason why they asked Michigan for that support. So that makes this job extremely exciting because you have this opportunity to not only influence your own school but have a strong influence in how dentistry is taught throughout the world. That’s a privilege for us at Michigan to be in this position.”

With an eye toward his future career options, Nör accepted a promotion to chair of the Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Endodontics (CRSE) in 2015, a position he held until his selection as Dean. As one of the largest departments at the dental school, it has a sizable budget, multiple divisions and a large roster of faculty and staff. “Being a chair here is the best way to prepare to become a dean,” he said. “Think about how many people were chairs at Michigan and became extremely successful deans at either this dental school or others. The list is really long. Our decentralized system gives more autonomy to the chairs for financial decisions. The work of

a department chair here is like managing a small dental school.”

cavity prep speaks to the essence of our teaching mission.”

Earlier in his career, Nör had already accepted leadership positions on boards, committees and sections of national and international dental organizations, and that has continued in recent years. (See related list with this article.) The highest profile position was as president of the American Association for Dental, Oral and Craniofacial Research (AADOCR, previously known as AADR) from 2021-22. With 3,100 members across the country, it is the largest division of the International Association for Dental Research. He’s published 230-plus peerreviewed publications and has served as Associate Editor of the Journal of Dental Research from 2010 to the present. His lengthy CV is rounded out with dozens of dental school and university committees, and long lists of students, researchers and junior faculty he has mentored.

The pace of being Dean doesn’t allow much time for musing about the past, but in a recent introductory interview Nör sprinkled his conversation with the names of faculty members and mentors who helped him along the three-decade path from graduate student to Dean. Polverini leads the list, along with McCauley, Mistretta, Johnston and too many more to risk an omission. The people he met encouraged him and pointed him to opportunities, one after another.

Bringing it all together As former Dean Peter Polverini noted, Nör has the advantage of a broad background that tracks well with almost every major aspect of the dental school, beginning with his general dentistry practice, then moving to graduate studies and a PhD in Oral Health Sciences, followed by many years of research prowess.

Despite that widespread expertise and the wide-ranging demands of being Dean, Nör has emphasized that he will continue to teach both predoctoral and graduate classes, though probably not as many. On a recent day, as he was manning a bench in the D1 Sim Lab, at times as many as four or five dental students gathered around to listen to his pointers or moved in close to watch his technique on a mannequin.

“I plan to maintain my clinical teaching duties while serving as dean as a way to stay grounded in the incredibly rewarding area that is our foundation – educating dental students,” he said. “I’ve taken great satisfaction in my work as chair of CRSE over the last eight years and in my research on stem cell biology and salivary gland cancer, which I will continue. However, there is something immensely satisfying in sharing my clinical expertise with first-year students in the Sim Lab in the Dent 519/520 Clinical Foundations courses. Showing a D1 student how to properly hold a handpiece and cut an ideal

In his speech to the AADOCR at the end of his term as its president in 2021, Nör said his career story is an international variation of the American Dream. He said he is an example of how a person can start from a simple origin, dream big and work hard, have much help along the way, and become part of a leading institution like the University of Michigan School of Dentistry and president of the AADOCR.

your work, once you have this opportunity, if you make good use of it, there is a concrete consequence, which is that you have another opportunity,” he said in his recent interview.

“I came to U-M for a graduate degree but at each step, there was an openness here to take a chance. Of course, it was what we did with that chance that mattered. There was never an impediment to move forward. Just the opposite. With each opportunity, a new opportunity came up. And that to me is the American Dream.”

“Many times I pinch myself,” Nör said.

“The odds are so low when I think about when I was finishing high school or dental school in Brazil. I never imagined that this was going to happen. It was never something I had planned for. It was a consequence of being in the right place at the right time and trying to do the best that I can in an honest and sincere way.”

“Once you are given an opportunity to show

The personal side of Dean Nör • Jacques and his wife Silvia have a son Lucas who is a senior in high school.

• Growing up in Brazil, Jacques’ brother and sister were much older so they left home when he was young, which meant he had to entertain himself. He wanted his son’s childhood to be different, so he’s made a concerted effort to spend time with Lucas, playing soccer, basketball, tennis and other activities.

• Jacques played the acoustic guitar and performed with a band in his early 20s.

He doesn’t play the guitar much these days.

• Reading non-fiction is a frequent pastime.

He’s recently read a biography of Winston Churchill and is reading a book on the history of Cambodia after he visited there last summer.

• Jacques usually travels back to Brazil once a year to see relatives and friends.

Jacques, Silvia and Lucas Nör at the massive Angkor Wat temple in Siem Reap, Cambodia, during a family trip last summer.

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Dean Announces Two Leadership Appointments Two new leadership appointments for the School of Dentistry were announced this fall

by Dean Jacques Nör. Dr. Mark Fitzgerald is the school’s new Senior Associate Dean, and Diane Wooden has been named Director of Budget and Financial Planning. Both appointments were effective Oct. 1.

Fitzgerald is a professor in the Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Dr. Mark Fitzgerald Endodontics and has served as Associate Dean for Community-Based Collaborative Care & Education (CBCE) since 2017. He will continue his CBCE leadership. In his new role, he will have broad responsibilities that include representing the dean at university and school functions; supporting the 2024 dental school accreditation process; leading the school's strategic planning; and continuing to provide oversight to Human Resources.

Fitzgerald earned his undergraduate degree, DDS and MS in restorative dentistry at the University of Michigan. His teaching, research and patient care, in both private practice and at the school, have been recognized with numerous awards and grants. He is particularly interested in interprofessional education (IPE) and care opportunities for

students. In the last several years, U-M’s Center for Interprofessional Education has honored Fitzgerald with awards for his work in the IPE field, and one of the team projects he participated in received a prize for innovative teaching from the University of Michigan Provost’s Office.

Wooden, as part of the dental school’s leadership team, will advise the dean Diane Wooden and senior administration on the varied and complex financial issues related to the school’s educational, patient care and research missions. She will support the fiscal operations of all units and activities in the school.

Wooden has been part of the school’s finance team for 15 years, with extensive experience in budget planning and clinical finance systems. She has served as Senior Manager for Budget and Finance since 2019, with prior roles as Financial Analyst and Accountant.

She holds a Master’s of Business Administration and Bachelor’s of Business Administration in Accounting, both from Eastern Michigan University.

Two Faculty Members Leading CRSE on Interim Basis Dr. Ron Heys was named Interim Chair and Dr. Gisele Neiva was named Interim Associate Chair of the Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Endodontics (CRSE) when the previous chair Jacques Nör became dean on August 1.

Dr. Heys, Associate Professor of Dentistry, teaches part-time in the predoctoral clinics and delivers patient care in private practice.

Dr. Ron Heys He has served as the CRSE Associate Chair since 2015. He graduated from the U-M School of Dentistry in 1972 with a DDS, and in 1975 with a master’s degree in Restorative Dentistry. His published research focuses on pulp biology and pulp response.

Dr. Neiva, Clinical Professor in CRSE, has been a faculty member for 22 years and involved in clinical and laboratory research for more

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Dr. Gisele Neiva

than 25 years. She is the Director of the Graduate Restorative Dentistry Program and of the Graduate Restorative Clinic.

She also serves as the school’s Director of Predoctoral Digital Dental Technologies.

She graduated from the Federal University of Paraná School of Dentistry in Brazil, and has earned two master’s degrees: in Restorative Dentistry from the U-M School of Dentistry and in Clinical Research Design and Statistical Analysis from U-M’s School of Public Health.

An eight-member search committee, chaired by Dr. Purnima Kumar, Chair of the Department of Periodontics and Oral Medicine, was appointed by Dean Nör in early December.

Profile for Success Class The 2023 Profile for Success students pose for a class photo at the U-M School of Dentistry in May. Also included are their student facilitators from the dental school and program directors.

The aspiring dentists are undergraduates at universities across the country, including U-M and several Michigan universities.

The six-week summer mentoring program, now in its 29th year, is designed to help increase the number of historically underrepresented minorities in the profession of dentistry.

Front row, from left: Interim Dean Jan Hu; Christin Willie, Spelman College; Kennedey Boyette, Spelman College; Mikela McPherson, Oakwood University; Dominic Johnson, Morehouse College; Tayla Johnson, Michigan State University; Kasheen Hirori, Eastern Michigan University.

Middle row, from left: Dinella Crosby, DEI Office Student Affairs Program Specialist; Kalmadeen Akorede, University of Michigan; Nixon Deleon Garcia, University of Detroit Mercy; Ndeye Ka, University of Detroit Mercy; Komiljon Omonov, Eastern Michigan University; Johnny Williams-Bryant, Barry University; Student Facilitator Delasi Denoo, U-M DDS Class of 2027.

Back row, from left: Faculty member Dr. Ken May; Jeremy Russ, Howard University; Gya Ferguson, Howard University; Charles Jackson, Oakwood University; Student Facilitator Dr. Brea Fleming, U-M DDS Class of 2023; and Dr. Todd Ester, Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.

Dr. Todd Ester Appointed Associate Dean for DEI Faculty member Dr. Todd Ester was appointed Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) at the School of Dentistry, effective Sept. 1, and also received a University of Michigan award for his work in the DEI area.

Dean Jacques Nör, with the support of the School of Dentistry Executive Committee, announced the five-year appointment, Dr. Todd Ester which was approved by the University of Michigan Board of Regents at its July meeting. Also effective in September, Dr. Ester was promoted to Clinical Associate Professor.

The university presented Ester with its 2023 Harold R. Johnson Diversity Award in September. He was one of six U-M faculty members who were honored for service that goes above and beyond their regular duties and contributes to the development of a culturally

and ethnically diverse campus community. The annual award has been bestowed by the U-M Office of the Provost since 1996 in honor of the former dean of the School of Social Work.

Nör noted that Ester, who has been the school’s Assistant Dean for DEI since 2018, has grown the role of the school’s DEI office significantly during that time. In the new expanded role, Ester will manage initiatives that increase DEI and will serve as the advisor to the school’s leadership in creating a supportive environment for the school’s community of patients, students, faculty and staff. He will advocate on institutional issues that relate to diversity, cultural sensitivity and health equities to support cultural competency, and will include collaboration on DEI initiatives across the university.

Ester graduated from Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia, then earned his DDS degree and a specialty certificate in endodontics from the U-M School of Dentistry. He also holds a Master’s degree in Health Education from the University of the Pacific. He is the program director and principal lecturer for the dental school’s Profile Continued

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Dr. Todd Ester (Continued)

for Success program, which helps prepare undergraduate students for careers in dentistry. The program is one of many ways Ester has helped broaden the pathway to dentistry careers for historically under-represented racial and ethnic students, staff and faculty. In addition to his work as a faculty member at the dental school, he practices in the Detroit area.

In 2019, the American Dental Education Association (ADEA), representing the nation’s dental schools, presented Ester with its prestigious William J. Gies award for initiatives promoting diversity, equity and inclusion. In 2020, he received the Colgate Palmolive

Faculty Award for Administration from the National Dental Association and in 2021 he was inducted into the Faculty of the Academy of General Dentistry. He has worked closely on DEI issues with national organizations, including ADEA, the National Dental Association, the Student National Dental Association, the Hispanic Dental Association, the Society for American Indian Dentists, the Michigan Dental Association and the American Dental Association.

He currently serves as the co-chair for the Diversity and Inclusion Advisory Committee for ADEA.

New Position to Focus on the Patient Experience A new initiative to improve the patient experience at the School of Dentistry is focusing on delivering an exceptional patient experience by fostering a culture of collaboration and continuous improvements with all the clinics and units.

As part of an assessment by the school’s Advancing the Patient Experience Committee, Andrea Morefield has been named Manager of Patient Operations in the Patient Services office. Morefield has worked at the school since 2010, most recently in the Endodontics division. In her new position, Morefield is responsible for overseeing the Call Centers for both the Pre-Doctoral and Grad/Specialty clinics, as well as the Centralized Check-in Team.

In announcing the appointment in September, Dr. Romesh Nalliah, Associate Dean for Patient Services, said Morefield has been an excellent leader in the Endodontics Clinic, where she was Allied Health Senior Supervisor. He noted that Morefield was already involved in the discussion of improved patient care as a member of the Advancing the Patient Experience Committee, which was chaired

by Cassandra Callaghan, the school’s Chief Information Officer.

“Andrea was selected because she brings a dedication to superior patient care, has a history of strong teamwork and collaboration, and experience in the change management process,” Nalliah said.

Morefield started at the dental school in 2010 as a dental assistant intermediate and became a supervisor in 2012, advancing to Allied Health Senior Supervisor in endodontics in 2019.

Director of Interprofessional Education Appointed Faculty member Dr. Danielle Rulli is the dental school’s new Director of Interprofessional Education (IPE).

In this new position announced early this year, Rulli will coordinate and lead IPE initiatives and represent the school across the University of Michigan and the broader IPE community.

The dental school has a long track record of supporting IPE, which brings together the various health and social sciences to promote a team approach to patient care.

U-M’s Center for Interprofessional Education coordinates IPE and collaborative training and care efforts.

Responsibilities for the director role include identifying IPE competencies for the DDS and DH programs; aligning DDS and DH curricula with the U-M Center for IPE core curriculum; leading the implementation of IPE curriculum maps; helping integrate IPE 10 SCHOOL M Dentistry | Fall 2023

activities in the new Delta Dental Integrated Special Care Clinic and the comprehensive care clinics; and exploring potential external Interprofessional Education and Care rotations.

Rulli, who is a Clinical Associate Professor in the Dental Hygiene Program and Director of the MSDH program, has been involved with IPE efforts across the university. She was a U-M Interprofessional Leaders Fellow, served as co-lead for several years on the universitywide introductory IPE courses, and serves on the Center for IPE’s Intentional Measurement and Research workgroup. She was part of an interprofessional team that received the Provost’s Teaching Innovation Prize in 2022.

Rulli received her BA in Behavioral Science from Metropolitan State College in Denver, Colorado. She completed her undergraduate dental hygiene degree at the University of Vermont, followed by an MS in Dental Hygiene Education from the University of North Carolina.

She received her Doctor of Health Science degree from Nova Southeastern University.

Sindecuse Spotlight Artifacts from the extensive collection at the dental school’s Sindecuse Museum of Dentistry

Compound Binocular Microscope Circa: 1865 Distinction: This microscope belonged to Dr. Willoughby Dayton Miller, a world-class visionary in the fields of dental biology and dental treatments in the late 1800s.

He was among the first to understand the impact of bacteria in dental decay and systemic health. An Ohio native who earned an undergraduate degree at U-M, Miller lived in Germany for 28 years and conducted research at the University of Berlin.

In 1906, the U-M School of Dentistry offered him its deanship and Miller accepted. He visited Ann Arbor briefly in the summer of 1907 and planned to begin his new role that fall. However, while visiting relatives in Ohio, he fell ill with appendicitis and died in Newark, Ohio, in July 1907 at age 54.

Artifact details: The brass compound microscope has adjustable Wenham-

style binocular body tubes mounted on a sturdy base. The body tubes were designed by W.H. Wenham in 1861 and are adjustable by means of a knurled knob that controls a rack and pinion gear set. Coarse focus is achieved through a set of knobs that move the inner pillar tube up and down through a rack gear set. The top of the pillar contains a fine focus knob. A circular stage contains a central aperture and has a slide carrier to assist in translating specimens during viewing. An inscription says: “R. & J. Beck / London 6725"

Provenance: Dr. Miller’s widow donated the microscope and other materials

to the historical collection of the dental school in 1908. A bas relief sculpture that serves as a memorial to Dr. Miller was installed on the south side of the school’s Kellogg Building along North University Avenue in 1940.

To see more of the Sindecuse Museum collections, go to www.sindecusemuseum.org/collectionsoverview

Sindecuse Expands Reach by Sharing With Other Venues The Sindecuse Museum of Dentistry staff is collaborating and sharing artifacts with two other museums and a library this fall, including two outside of Michigan.

Content developed and displayed by the museum last year related to alumna Dr. Jessica Rickert (DDS 1975), the first female Native American dentist in the country, is receiving a second showing this fall at the Grand Rapids (Michigan) Children’s Museum. Artifacts donated

by Dr. Rickert, along with coloring book pages featuring her, were part of a Sindecuse exhibit developed last year to celebrate Native American Heritage Month.

Also this fall, the A.T. Still Memorial Library in Kirksville, Missouri, is using parts of the Sindecuse’s 2013 exhibit, “Women Dentists: Changing the Face of Dentistry.”

Sindecuse Curator Tammy Barnes said the staff redesigned content from the exhibit into a flat-panel display for the Missouri library and will print its own version of the refreshed display at a later time.

A third venue, the Hill-Stead Museum, in Farmington, Connecticut, borrowed artifacts from the Sindecuse for an exhibit that is a cross-disciplinary survey of 22 American women born in the year 1867. One of the subjects is Ida Gray, who graduated from the U-M School of Dentistry in 1890 as the first Black woman in the country to earn a dental degree. The women chosen for the exhibit are from multiple cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds, and they represent a variety of professions and avocations, including the arts, medicine, literature, journalism, education, social welfare, and more. The title of the exhibit, “Born in 1867: Theodate’s Generation,” refers to Theodate Pope Riddle, one of the first American female architects and a philanthropist who designated that her family estate, called Hill-Stead, be preserved as a museum after her death in 1946. The exhibit runs through March 31, 2024.

SCHOOL 11 M Dentistry | Fall 2023

Among those with dental school connections at the opening reception for the United We Smile Clinic were, from left, Mengziao Nie, D4 student; William Barton, a technical consultant for dental supplier Ivocar; Dr. William Lee (DDS 1987), a local dentist who is a preceptor for the program; Dr. Howard Hamerink, Program Director; Maxwell Shin, D4 student; Dean Jacques Nör; Karim Tabbaa, D4 student; and Mohamed Kazbour, D4 student.

School Joins With United Way For Veterans Care Clinic The dental school’s Victors for Veterans Program has entered a new era in Traverse City, Michigan, with a brand new facility and an innovative partnership with the United Way of Northwest Michigan (UWNWMI).

The veterans program, known as V4V for short, is a four-year student team commitment that includes an Institutional Review Board-approved clinical study of care and patient quality of life.

The program was started by the dental school in 2012 as a way to engage dental students in providing care for underserved veterans in the Traverse City and Gaylord areas of northern Michigan. When the school’s agreement with an existing clinic site in Traverse City ended last year, finding a new site was a priority because of significant unmet patient care in the area.

An opportunity with the local United Way organization resulted in a new clinic called United We Smile.

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Dental school faculty member Dr. Howard Hamerink, who directs V4V, credits the tireless efforts of Jennifer Kerns, the Traverse City V4V Clinic Care Coordinator, with making the connection to United Way and completing the many steps necessary for the collaboration.

United We Smile is part of the local United Way organization’s effort “to mobilize the caring power of our community,” said Executive Director Seth Johnson in a press release. He described the new clinic as “a cutting-edge modern version of our capabilities as a nonprofit. We are no longer just fundraisers. We are the ones making the change.” United Way will focus on dental care for children, pregnant women, veterans, and those with developmental and cognitive disabilities in their area.

Hamerink and School of Dentistry Dean Jacques Nör attended the clinic’s opening

reception in early September. The new project, like the previous location, is part of the dental school’s Community-Based Collaborative Care and Education Program, of which Hamerink is associate director.

Pre-doctoral students and graduate residents complete rotations at the clinic to provide a variety of dental procedures for veterans who meet low-income guidelines. Students are supervised by faculty and volunteer adjunct faculty called preceptors from around the Traverse City area.

After a decade of success with the initial V4V site in Traverse City, the dental school added two other locations for the program – at the VINA Community Dental Center in Brighton in 2020 and at the Gary Burstein Community Health Clinic in Pontiac in 2022.

FACULT Y

Faculty Notes Faculty member Dr. Margherita Fontana was elected president of a prominent European dental caries research group during its annual conference in July, marking the first time the organization has been led by an individual from a university outside of Europe. The European Organization for Caries Research (ORCA) named Fontana as its president during its 70th annual conference held in the Netherlands. Other current officers are from the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Germany. Fontana is the Clifford Nelson Endowed Professor of Dentistry in the Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences, and Endodontics. She is recognized internationally as a leading scientist in the field of cariology and has an extensive clinical research background in childhood caries management. “Caries is the leading dental disease experienced by people around the world, so it’s important to strengthen the worldwide network of researchers who are working to find the best evidencebased solutions for treating and, more importantly, preventing caries,” Fontana said. “I’m honored to lead ORCA, which has a longstanding commitment to this research. With its new global agenda, ORCA is emphasizing prevention and research on a larger scale and I look forward to helping in this pursuit.”

Dr. Dennis Fasbinder, Clinical Professor of Dentistry in the Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Endodontics, has been appointed to the Michigan Board of Dentistry by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. He was appointed for a four-year term expiring in June 2027.

Fasbinder was appointed to represent dentists for the board. The Michigan Board of Dentistry was formed to regulate the practice of dentistry and dental hygiene, authorize dental assistants, and certify specialists in the fields of orthodontics, endodontics, prosthodontics, pediatric dentistry, periodontics, oral and maxillofacial surgery, and oral pathology. Fasbinder earned his DDS degree from the U-M School of Dentistry in 1982.

His faculty work is focused on applications of digital technology in dentistry and CAD/CAM systems for the fabrication of esthetic restorations.

Dr. Margherita Fontana

Dr. Dennis Fasbinder

Dr. Purnima Kumar

Kumar is the William K. and Mary Anne Najjar Professor of Periodontics and chair of the Department of Periodontics and Oral Medicine. She is a dual-trained periodontist and microbial ecologist whose research investigates the myriad ways in which the human microbiome can be harnessed to promote health. Kumar has authored or contributed to numerous scientific papers investigating the oral microbiome and she serves as associate editor of several journals related to periodontology and microbiology. Several national institutes have provided funding for her work.

Dr. Lauren Surface, Assistant Professor in the Department of Biologic and Materials Sciences and Prosthodontics, was one of 10 researchers who received the 2023 Harold Frost Young Investigator Award presented by the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research (ASBMR). Eight of the researchers were from U.S. universities and two were from international universities. The award allows early-career ASBMR investigators to participate in the Orthopaedic Research Society’s International Musculoskeletal Biology Workshop, an annual meeting that emphasizes interaction between young investigators and senior investigators, held this year in Utah in July. Surface received her bachelor of science degree in neurobiology from the University of Washington. She received her PhD in biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, studying the role of chromatin in embryonic stem cell lineage commitment. Her postdoctoral research was done at Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital, where her work utilized genome-wide association to understand the response of osteogenic cells to drugs and mineral ions. She is the recipient of the NIH/NIAMS K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Grant, and is a U-M Biological Sciences Scholar.

Dr. Chris Roberts, an adjunct orthodontics professor at the dental school since 1990, was featured in an article in the University Record, U-M’s campus-wide publication, this fall. It wasn’t for anything related to dentistry, however. Instead, it reported that Roberts is preparing to run the Boston Marathon next April for the 25th time, and 22nd consecutive year. Roberts told the Record that no matter how many times he stands at the starting line of the famous event, his emotions well up when the National Anthem is played and military jets fly over. The race is “the epitome of running,” he said, and Dr. Chris Roberts he feels fortunate to be reaching the No. 25 milestone.

Faculty member and department chair Dr. Purnima Since he first ran the most famous 26.2 miles in 1998, Kumar received one of the highest honors bestowed he has missed it only twice when it conflicted with his children’s high by the International Association for Dental, Oral, and Craniofacial school sporting events. Once he completes No. 25 next spring, he will Research (IADR) at its annual general session in Bogota, Colombia, no longer need to meet a qualifying time to enter in future years. The in June. The IADR Distinguished Scientist Research in Periodontal complete Record story can be found here: https://record.umich.edu/ Disease Award is one of 17 distinguished scientist awards the articles/dentistry-professor-preparing-for-25th-boston-marathon/ organization presents. It recognizes outstanding achievements in research in periodontal disease and its translation to clinical care.

Dr. Lauren Surface

FACULTY 13 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

Dr. Marco Bottino confers with Maedeh Rahimnejad, a postdoctoral researcher in his lab. In the background is a highly translatable biofabrication platform that can, among many capabilities, engineer 3D complex living tissues by converging cell printing technologies with sophisticated biofabrication tools, such as ceramic printing.

Faculty Profile Dr. Marco Bottino: Advancing biomaterials for regenerative tissue applications Dr. Marco Bottino is the Robert W. Browne Endowed Professor of Dentistry in the Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences, and Endodontics (CRSE). He is CRSE’s Director of Research and Director of the Postgraduate Program in Regenerative Dentistry. An internationally recognized leader in the field of regenerative medicine, he investigates clinically relevant biofabrication strategies for engineering dental, oral, and craniofacial tissues, with a focus on the development of personalized therapeutics for periodontal tissue regeneration. He has received extramural funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), foundations, and private industry. Bottino joined the dental school in 2017 after a previous faculty position at Indiana University School of Dentistry.

He has published regularly and received awards for research excellence and mentorship from national and international organizations. He has served on numerous grant review panels of the NIH and held leadership positions within the International Association for Dental Research.

He is a frequent reviewer for journals in regenerative medicine and biomaterials. In the following question-and-answer interview, he provides insight into his work.

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Q: You began your career path with a DDS degree. Why did you redirect to the scientific research side of oral health?

delivered through collaborative translational approaches. Translating research to clinical implementation is of the utmost importance and public relevance. As an example, a few years ago, I was approached by a start-up company (Matregenix in Irvine, California) to validate the pre-clinical efficacy of their proprietary polymeric membrane for guided bone regeneration. This collaboration successfully resulted in funding support from the NIH/NIDCR and the preparation of a premarket submission to the Food and Drug Administration. We are now waiting to learn if we will secure the next level of funding to expedite the translation of this technology to the clinics.

A: I had the opportunity to complete several research projects while in dental school in the field of restorative dentistry. That was when I decided to pursue a clinician-scientist academic career with a focus on the development of novel biomaterials and drug delivery therapeutics for dental tissue regeneration.

I practiced general dentistry for a few years and then went to graduate school to deepen my knowledge of engineering and designing aspects of creating biomaterials for regenerative applications.

Q: Your lab uses engineering tools such as nanotechnology, biofabrication and stem cell therapies to develop biologically active biomaterial scaffolds that enhance the regeneration of damaged periodontal tissue. How are these new technologies, such as 3D printing and bioprinting, enhancing your research?

A: Successful and predictable reconstruction of tissues and organs lost due to disease, trauma or congenital anomalies remains a major challenge in dentistry and medicine.

Recent strides in tissue engineering include unraveling the role of stem cells, biological signals and scaffolds in building functional tissues. Biofabrication uses 3D printing technologies to engineer biologically functional and highly organized structures, primarily using biomaterials and cells, that can be used to treat periodontitis. Our research group is focused on developing patient-specific solutions to support the regeneration of multiple tissues affected by periodontitis.

We are using 3D bioprinting technologies to create patient-specific grafts based on patient imaging data from Cone Beam Computed Tomography to amplify the regeneration of periodontal tissues.

Q: Another of your lab’s research areas is developing injectable collagen-based hydrogels. How are these biocompatible materials used after root canals to support the regeneration of the pulp and dentin in necrotic immature permanent teeth?

A: Traditional therapeutics of necrotic immature permanent teeth allow for infection control but support neither root development

nor restoration of the immunocompetence of the pulp. Over the last decade, we have been working on synthesizing highly tunable collagen scaffolds that can be incorporated with the patient’s stem cells to encourage dentin and pulp regeneration. Our strategy is to inject these stem cell-laden collagen scaffolds into root canals of devitalized immature permanent teeth to instruct simultaneous pulp-dentin tissue regeneration. The resulting data are informing novel regenerative-based therapeutics to treat necrotic immature permanent teeth and, thus, the potential of prolonging the use of natural dentition.

Q: You have a robust track record of publications, grants, and awards.

This year you’ve had more than 18 publications in numerous important scientific journals, including the American Chemical Society Applied Materials and Interfaces, Biomaterials Advances, Bioactive Materials, Acta Biomaterialia, and Journal of Materials Chemistry B, among others. From your latest research findings, what areas are you most excited about?

A: My guiding principle for high-impact research is that it should be founded on addressing real-world needs, developed using combined scientific principles, and

Q: Your research grants and published papers always have a significant number of collaborators, often from around the world. How important is collaboration in your work?

A: I highly value the intellectual stimulation from working with a diverse group of faculty, staff, and students. My laboratory aims to provide an inclusive and integrated platform to train motivated students, including those from diverse and underrepresented backgrounds, and foster facultydriven interdisciplinary collaboration. That includes faculty colleagues at the School of Dentistry and others working nationally and internationally. Also, here at U-M, we are currently in the process of establishing a campus-wide Biofabrication Center to enable training and collaboration in this fast-evolving field. While U-M offers access to traditional 3D printers for manufacturing 3D shapes/objects and prototypes of prosthetics, our laboratory at the School of Dentistry was the first on campus to house a highly translatable biofabrication platform. Now, we can engineer personalized 3D complex living tissues because it has the capacity to converge cell-printing technologies with sophisticated biofabrication tools (ceramic printing, for example).

The long-term goal of my research program is to provide an inclusive and collaborative environment to develop enabling technologies that advance diagnostic and therapeutic discoveries for treating dental, oral, and craniofacial-related diseases.

See Related Video https://myumi.ch/63ZM6

FACULTY 15 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

90th Smiles DDS students in the school’s Sim Lab crowd around adjunct clinical assistant professor Dr. Tom Johnson to wish him a happy 90th birthday before the start of a celebratory luncheon a few days before his actual birthday on Aug. 4. Johnson has been an adjunct in the Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Endodontics Department since 2001. He graduated from the school in 1959 and served two years in the U.S. Army from 1959-1961, then opened a dental office in Dearborn, Michigan. In 1990, he opened a second office in Ann Arbor and phased out the Dearborn office.

D2 Eleni Kuffner (left) listens to Dr. Johnson earlier that day in Sim Lab. She said she admires his extensive knowledge of clinical dentistry. “He is always eager to share new strategies and insights with students, especially when they've expressed struggles. It’s evident that he truly cares about our learning by checking in, as well as making himself available for help by coming in after hours.”

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FACULTY 17 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

RESEARCH

Left: Ryan Koa (left) confers with faculty member Dr. Peng Li and Karin Harumi Uchima Koecklin, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow, at the Life Sciences Institute in this file photo.

Koa worked in the Li lab while in the dental school’s MS in OHS program. He is now a D1 at the dental school.

research experience in the hard sciences and they were extremely kind and helpful, willing to go out of their way to help.”

Enrollment grows for MS degree in OHS The School of Dentistry has expanded the class size for its Masters of Science degree in Oral Health Sciences after the first two years of the new program proved to be popular with applicants from across the country and internationally.

and they realize, ‘I can do this, I can run this experiment.’ And eventually they say they want to do more and keep growing.”

The dental school added the one-year Master’s degree program in 2020 to allow students considering dental school to strengthen their academic and research credentials for applying to DDS programs; to strengthen student’s applications for either DDS/PhD or PhD programs; and to prepare students for a research laboratory management career.

Ryan Koa is an example of the benefits of the program. He was interested in going to dental school, but wanted to enter the MS program first as a way to prepare for the rigors of dental school. He worked in the lab of Dr. Peng Li at U-M’s Life Sciences Institute. Li is a Research Assistant Professor there, as well as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biologic and Materials Sciences & Prosthodontics at the dental school and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Molecular and Integrative Physiology at the U-M Medical School.

Li’s primary research interest is to understand the molecular and neural basis of breathing, a fundamental body function maintaining homeostasis.

Dental school faculty member and program director Dr. Elisabeta Karl said the program allows students to expand their research skills and academic credentials significantly.

“I think what has been really great about the program in the first two years is that we are showing students who have very little or no research experience, that it is possible,” Karl said. “They may have had obstacles of various kinds that kept them from exploring research, so they may lack confidence in that area. In our program, they only need a little guidance from our faculty mentors

Koa credits Dr. Li and a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in his lab, Karin Harumi Uchima Koecklin, with sharing their expertise and patience. “I came in with no

The school admitted 17 students to the MS degree cohort that started with the summer session in June 2023. Only six students were in the cohorts during each of the first two years of the program.

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Koa focused on the neural circuitry that coordinates jaw opening and closing. He traced neurons in the jaw-closing muscle as a way to better understand the signaling between the brain and the muscle. His work was presented earlier this year at the dental’s school’s Research Day with poster entitled, “Neural Pathways Mediating the Coordination of Jaw Movement.”

During his year of research for the MS degree, Koa said he grew more confident about applying to dental schools and was accepted to U-M as a member of the Class of 2027, a validation of sort for choosing the MS program. “It’s been challenging, but it’s what I expected,” he said of the MS program. “You are among the best of the best, not only professors but faculty and other students. With that comes some pressure, but a fun type of pressure. People want you to succeed. You are here for a reason and people want to help.”

Students have two options for completing the program. The Research-Intensive option requires an MS thesis based on laboratory research. Dental school faculty offer research opportunities in a wide variety of research areas – oral cancer, regenerative dentistry, craniofacial development, and pulp stem cells, to name a few. But the school has also cultivated research mentors among faculty in other schools and colleges on campus, so the MS students are free to explore outside the dental school.

The second, Course-Intensive option is a mix of dental school courses and seminars, along with courses the students choose in other areas of the university, with a capstone project that is more likely to be literature review, for example, rather than research in a lab. Students are part of a Journal Club and Seminar Series and take various core courses, including basic histology, cell and molecular biology, biochemistry and other courses suggested by mentors and the program director.

See Related Video https://myumi.ch/kxe8j

Research Notes PhD Candidate Draws National and International Awards Yao Yao, a student in the dental school’s PhD in Oral Sciences program has received two significant awards this year –– one national and one international.

She was presented with the Outstanding Student Researcher Award by the American Association for Dental, Oral and Craniofacial Research (AADOCR). She was one of only two people in the country to receive the award among the dental students, dental residents, graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. The Student Research Group of AADOCR established the award to provide national recognition for outstanding student researchers who are highly productive in research and dedicated to advancing dental research.

Yao also received the Women in Science Promising Talent Award this year from the American Association for Dental, Oral and Craniofacial Research (IADR). It is presented by the executive committee of the IADR Women in Science Network to recognize the dedication and talent of women early in their dental-related education and careers. Yao was selected from applicants around the world in the award category for women working on their Master’s or PhD degrees, or as postdocs in oral, dental and craniofacial research. Yao said she was grateful for the award since many researchers further into their careers, with excellent publication records, were eligible for the award.

Researchers from the University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center, including Dr. Nisha D’Silva from the School of Dentistry, have identified a new metric to articulate the relationship between nerve density and oral cancer. The study, published early this year in Clinical Cancer Research, investigated normalized nerve density to translate previous mechanistic studies into a context that could be used in the clinic. “We are recognizing more and more that there’s a very dynamic interaction between nerves and cancer cells in the tumor microenvironment,” said D’Silva, the senior author and Donald Kerr Endowed Collegiate Professor of Dentistry and Professor of Pathology at the Medical School. The team created a standardized metric for nerve density to clarify the variation in distribution of nerves in the oral cavity, called normalized nerve density, and showed its importance in tumor progression. “We showed that tumors with high normalized nerve density seem to be associated with poor survival for patients with tongue cancer, which is the most common type of oral cancer,” D’Silva explained. “We also found that patients with high normalized nerve density and a smaller distance between the nerve and the tumor have poorer outcomes.”

Yao reached the U-M dental school from China via Canada. While she was in dental school in China, she completed a summer research internship at the University of Toronto, where she worked in a worldclass health science research lab. “That enabled me to see how a professor or principal investigator can lead such a large research team and bridge the basic scientific research with the clinical treatments, That was very inspiring,” she said. It led her to apply to dental school graduate programs across the U.S. to begin her research career after earning her dental degree in China.

She arrived at U-M in 2018 to start the five-year course of study for a PhD in Oral Health Sciences. This fall, she is working to finish her dissertation in anticipation of receiving her PhD early next year.

The success of a national push to reduce opioid prescriptions for dental procedures is continuing, but the progress slowed during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a study published in the online journal PLOS ONE by U-M researchers including co-author Dr. Romesh Nalliah, a professor and Associate Dean for Patient Services at the dental school. Americans undergoing painful dental procedures are far less likely to be prescribed opioid painkillers than they were just a few years ago. Reducing the number of opioids dispensed to dental patients is part of an initiative to reduce opioid abuse, addiction and overdoses. Previous research shows that non-opioid pain medications are effective in controlling patients’ pain from most dental procedures.

Researchers estimated that 6.1 million more dental opioid prescriptions were dispensed between June 2020 and December 2022 than would have been if pre-pandemic trends had continued. Researchers theorized that the decline may be related to dentists prescribing opioids in case patients were unable to make follow-up visits to the dentist because of pandemic limitations. The pandemic may also have led to reduced dental care that prompted more dental emergencies requiring more painful procedures, the study suggested. “While it’s reassuring that dental opioid prescribing is declining,” Nalliah said, “the recent slowing in the decline suggests the dental profession must redouble its efforts to reduce unnecessary opioid prescribing.”

RESEARCH 19 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

Isabelle Lombaert Receives Major Innovation Award School of Dentistry faculty member Dr. Isabelle Lombaert, a principal investigator for research on finding solutions for dry mouth, or xerostomia, has received a major funding award of $500,000. She is one of the 2023 recipients of the University of Michigan Medical School's Frankel Innovation Initiative Award, a research fund that supports the development of life-saving therapies and innovative new technologies at U-M. Lombaert’s project, “Non-viral Gene Therapy to Treat Xerostomia,” was chosen from several proposals during three selection stages. It will support the commercialization of the investigational product by contributing towards essential preclinical studies that are required to receive Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Investigational New Drug (IND) approval to initiate the first-in-human clinical trial.

“Our team developed a non-viral gene delivery platform that is free from immune response,” Lombaert said. “This platform will allow us to advance the gene therapy path for xerostomia. Through the Frankel

Innovation Initiative program, we aim to finalize preclinical studies to enable our FDA IND filing to support a first-in-human trial.”

In the U.S., an estimated 66,920 head-and-neck cancer patients suffer annually from xerostomia after receiving radiotherapy treatment.

Healthy tissues, such as saliva-producing salivary glands, are in the radiation field and lose their function. Loss of saliva production results in many oral-related dry mouth issues.

Lombaert is an Associate Professor of Dentistry in the Department of Biologic and Materials Sciences & Prosthodontics. Her lab, which is part of the Biointerfaces Institute located on the North Campus Research Center, focuses on the design of therapies to regenerate damaged tissues.

The funding from the Frankel Innovation Initiative comes in addition to the continued support of the NIH-NIDCR Michigan-PittsburghWyss Regenerative Medicine Resource Center (MPWRM)'s Interdisciplinary Translational Project program to Dr. Lombaert’s team.

MPWRM’s mission is to provide NIH funding to support teams in translating dental, oral, and craniofacial tissue engineering, and regenerative medicine therapies into the clinical marketplace.

SPONSORED RESE ARCH AWARDS >$50,000 from April 1, 2023, to September 30, 2023 NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH AND OTHER FEDERAL AGENCIES Margherita Fontana with Elisabeta Karl, James Boynton, Carlos Gonzalez, Livia Tenuta, Marcia Campos: (UH3) NIH, $842,795. Phase III RCT of the Effectiveness of Silver Diamine Fluoride in Arresting Cavitated caries Lesions.

Isabelle Lombaert: NIH, $360,456.

AAV-AQP1 Gene Therapy in Irradiated Salivary Glands.

Purnima Kumar: (R01) NIH; $586,947.

E-cigarettes and Perturbations in the Subgingival Ecosystem.

Yuji Mishina, Vesa Kaartinen: (K12) NIH, $1,039,055. DSPP Scholar Training at the University of Michigan School of Dentistry.

Yu Leo Lei, James Moon (U-M biomedical engineering): (R01) NIH; $561,890.

Restoring the Immunogenicity of Head and Neck Cancer.

20 RESEARCH M Dentistry | Fall 2023

Isabelle Lombaert with Joshua Emrick, Stephanie The: (R01) NIH; $3,154,376.

Defining the Targets and Function of Direct Trigeminal Sensory Innervation to Salivary Glands.

Antonio Morales-Hernandez: (R00) NIH, $747,001. GPRASP Family as Novel Regulators in Hematopoietic Stem Cells.

Purnima Kumar: Oregon Health and Science University/NIH; $66,680.

Bio-Responsive and Immune Protein-Based Therapies for Inhibition of Proteolytic Enzymes in Dental Tissues.

Isabelle Lombaert: University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston/NIH; $616,200. Functional Biointegration of Bioengineered Salivary Tissues in Irradiated Animal Models.

FOUNDATIONS, INDUSTRY and OTHER AWARDS Nan Hatch: 1cBio, Inc., $103,687.

Initial Cell Culture Studies With Enpp1 Inhibitor Compounds for Treatment of Hypophosphatasia in Mice.

Neville McDonald: Delta Dental Plan of Michigan, $60,000. An in Vivo Evaluation of Portray.

Colonya Calhoun with Iwonka Eagle, Danielle Rulli, Brent Ward: $74,762.

Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Feno’s FMET Plaque Removal.

Howard Hamerink with Mark Fitzgerald: Michigan Dental Foundation, $50,000.

Victors for Veterans (2023-26).

Berna Saglik, Fei Liu, Junying Li: Straumann Holding AG, $65,000.

3D Virtual Patient Assisted Full-arch Implant Rehabilitation Digital Workflow.

Kenichi Kuroda: Yonsei University, $186,495. Symbiotic Biocompatible Medical Device Material and Productization Technology Development for PatientCustomized Direct Printed Biliary Stent-Orthodontic Appliance.

DENTAL HYGIENE

Dental Hygiene Students’ Scholarship Success Continues 3 KCP Grants From State of Michigan

CEW+ Again Supports DH Students

Three students in the School of Dentistry’s graduate dental hygiene program have each received a significant state grant that encourages the development of faculty teaching careers in postsecondary education.

The extensive annual fellow and scholarship program of CEW+ at the University of Michigan has again this year included students at the School of Dentistry in its awards.

The former Center for the Education of Women awarded grants averaging $11,000 to 104 students across U-M’s three campuses. CEW+ presented scholar awards to the following Dental Hygiene students:

Ellese Blackmon Smith, Edith Dana and Rowie Fuertes and each received the King-Chavez-Parks Future Faculty Fellowship Program grant. The three are in their second year of the school’s two-year program leading to a Master’s of Dental Hygiene degree.

Dental Hygiene faculty member Dr. Danielle Rulli, director of the master’s program, said students in previous years have received the King-Chavez-Parks grant, but it is unusual for the school to have three outstanding students receive the award in the same year. It is also unusual that each received the maximum $20,000 grant, she said, since the amount, which is based on student financial need, is often less than the maximum.

Recipients of the grant, known as the KCP, agree to obtain a master’s degree, then pursue either a doctoral degree or begin a teaching or approved administrative career at a two- or four-year postsecondary institution within specified time periods and for a minimum commitment of up to two years, depending on the amount of the award. (In addition to the award for master’s degree students, there is a KCP program for doctoral students with different requirements.)

Fuertes received another significant grant, the Eduardo and Aurora Sevilla Graduate Student Award from U-M’s Rackham Graduate School. Fuertes said that $5,000 award and the KCP award allow her to focus on her education. “Since I work limited hours while I am in school, these awards will help me pay my tuition and lessen the burden of my student loan,” Fuertes said.

“They inspire me to strive harder to improve my personal and professional growth.”

The Future Faculty Fellowship Program was created by the Michigan State Legislature in 1986 as part of the larger King-Chavez-Parks Initiative, named for the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., César Chávez and Rosa Parks.

The initiative was designed to stem the downward spiral of college graduation rates for students underrepresented in postsecondary education and to increase the pool of academically or economically disadvantaged candidates pursuing faculty teaching careers in postsecondary education.

Ellese Blackmon Smith

Edith Dana

Rowie Fuertes

Kasandra Bowden

Kasandra Bowden, an MSDH student, was named a Margaret Dow Towsley Scholar. CEW+ cited Bowden’s commitment to giving back to underserved communities.

Growing up in Detroit, she has witnessed disparities in healthcare access, which included her own dental issues that she overcame with the help of an encouraging dental hygienist. It prompted her to pursue a bachelor’s degree in hygiene at the University of Detroit Mercy. She volunteered her services throughout Detroit and took a position managing the mobile dental program of a nonprofit health center, all while raising four children. With a master’s degree, she hopes to have an even greater impact as a mentor, educator and public health partner.

Rowie Fuertes, an MSDH student, was named a Joan P. Ireland Scholar. CEW+ noted that Fuertes began her dentistry-related career in the Philippines then moved to the U.S. where she worked as a dental assistant for 17 years and raised her children. She has volunteered her services at a nonprofit clinic and participated in five dental missions in the Philippines. As a prelude to her intent to evenutally teach, her research thesis is: “Assessment of the Efficacy of the Periodontal Endoscope as an Educational Tool to Improve Dental Hygiene Students’ Tactile Detection and Instrumentation Skills.”

Alicia Smith, an MSDH student, was named a Beth Halloran Scholar. In introducing the award, CEW+ cited Smith’s successful balancing of her career and motherhood. She worked as a hygienist at a dental practice in Chicago, then joined a pediatric dental practice dedicated to serving children with special healthcare needs, which led to her passion for helping children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). She returned to school for her Bachelor’s degree and now her Master’s at U-M, where she is also an adjunct clinical faculty member. She hopes to provide families affected by ASD “with support, a dental voice, and greater interprofessional relationships among health providers.”

Alicia Smith DENTAL HYGIENE 21 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

Hygienist Returns for Bachelor's Degree at Age 57 Supportive family, dental practice help Beth Al-Heleal reach goal The term “non-traditional student” recognizes college students who, among other demographics, don’t follow the traditional timeline of earning their degrees shortly after high school.

In May, Beth Al-Heleal was certainly non-traditional – and thrilled – when she walked across the stage at the School of Dentistry commencement to receive her bachelor’s degree in Dental Hygiene at age 57.

Beth completed the two-year Degree Completion E-Learning Program offered by the school’s Dental Hygiene Division. She graduated summa cum laude and was inducted into the Nu chapter of Sigma Phi Alpha, the national dental hygiene honors society.

The bachelor’s degree came 36 years after she earned her Associates Degree in Dental Hygiene at Lansing Community College in 1987. In the interim three-plus decades, she had established a 22 DENTAL HYGIENE M Dentistry | Fall 2023

solid career as a registered dental hygienist at practices in Ohio and Michigan. For the last 26 of those 36 years, she has worked with Dr. Kimberly Rice, a dentist who practices in Ypsilanti and is an adjunct faculty member at the dental school.

Over the years, Beth had considered additional education, including perhaps a DDS degree, but raising a family took priority. In recent years, as the twists and turns of life played out, Beth found herself raising her six children as a single mom.

The household dynamic had changed. Even though most of her children – five daughters and a son – have still lived at home in recent years, they were older now (currently ages 16 to 33) and less dependent on her. She felt the need to break out of her comfort zone and to prove to herself and to others that she could achieve the college degree that had always been secondary to other considerations.

Left: After the dental school graduation in May, Beth Al-Heleal poses for a family photo with her children, from left, Baneen, Shems, Aciya, Zach, Fatima and Zayrah.

“It was a personal goal to kind of find myself as my own person along this journey of being on my own. Yes, I can do this. Yes, I am smart. Yes, I need to discover myself as a person. Just proving that I could do it and to better my education,” she said. “Had life been different, I probably would have gone to dental school and become a dentist.

But I got married and had babies instead.

But I always had dental hygiene, which I’ve always loved. It’s my thing. I can’t imagine doing anything else. But I wanted to find out with this program: What’s out there in dental hygiene? I’ve been so secluded in one spot for so many years. I wanted to open up my eyes and see what’s going on in the world.”

The study routine was challenging for the two-year program, which is done almost entirely online with intensive reading and writing assignments that must be completed each week. Because Beth continued to work at the Rice practice, her evenings and most of her Saturdays and Sundays were devoted to studying. Her children learned to cope with not always having dinner prepared by their mom and with the laundry sometimes piling up.

illustrates why the program was created.

“It was designed for practicing dental hygienists to complete their bachelor degree while maintaining their personal and professional responsibilities in their community of choice,” Cullen said. “Beth is a great example of a student who was able to coordinate countless work and family demands with the online design of the academic program. While much of the didactic work is accessed online, the other extensive experiential learning opportunities are highly regarded by graduates of the program. Beth completed her servicelearning and student teaching experiences just a few miles from her home.”

As Beth continues her role as clinic supervisor for Dr. Rice, she says the classroom and clinic portions of earning the BSDH

have strengthened her communication and leadership skills. It also introduced her to research and how to better organize material for sharing with her staff and colleagues.

One of the areas she explored as part of the degree was laser therapy. For her capstone project she developed a continuing education manuscript titled, “Laser Assisted Periodontal Therapy: Application and Integration of Diode Lasers into Clinical Practice.” The manuscript was completed with Cullen, who was her faculty advisor, and Nicole Fortune, a nationally recognized hygienist, author and educator. It is currently undergoing review for publication in Dimensions of Dental Hygiene, a peer-reviewed journal for hygienists.

Working on the degree and observing the teaching environment in the dental school clinics also bolstered Beth’s already-strong advocacy for educating patients about oral systemic health – that good oral health is directly related to good overall health. “I already felt like a really important part of my job as a hygienist was motivating patients and now it is even more so,” she said.

Beth’s personal cheering squad at both the dental school graduation and the main university ceremony at Michigan Stadium were her six children, who enthusiastically celebrated her accomplishment. Besides the personal satisfaction Beth achieved, she knew her quest for the degree was sending a signal to her children, who are at various stages of their educational journeys. “This is a big deal,” she said. “It’s a huge accomplishment for me on so many different levels. You’d think I got my PhD. But it goes beyond the education. It’s pretty inspiring for my kids, pretty motivating: ‘Mom did it, we can keep going, too.’ ”

“Everyone was just incredibly flexible and worked with me so that I didn’t have to miss work, or if I had a conflict of some kind.

It wasn’t easy for my kids, but they knew how much this meant to me. Everyone at the dental practice helped. Dr. Rice was so supportive and adjusted the staff schedule, especially when I had to do my practicum in-person at the dental school for seven weeks near the end. Jennifer Cullen and everyone at the dental school were so accommodating.”

Cullen, the dental hygiene faculty member who directs the e-learning program, said Beth’s story

Beth Al-Heleal discusses good habits to improve oral health with a patient during a cleaning at the practice of Dr. Kimberly Rice.

DENTAL HYGIENE 23 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

STUDENTS

New DDS Class Brings Impressive Credentials The DDS Class of 2027 arrived at the School of Dentistry in June with 109 students bringing lofty academic credentials and compelling personal stories from across Michigan and around the country.

The first week of orientation was a series of introductory meetings, equipment check-outs and the start of classes. Staff members and second-year students roamed the Sim Lab on Day 2 to help the new students identify the many hand tools and other equipment stored in the drawers of their bench locations. What seemed strange that day is already much more familiar a few months later.

At the end of July, friends and family of the D1s gathered from around the country for the class’s White Coat Ceremony at Hill Auditorium. The keynote speaker was Dr. Eric Knudsen, president of the Michigan Dental Association and a 1995 alumnus of the school who practices in Escanaba, Michigan. He emphasized the need for an enduring commitment to the best and most ethical treatment of patients, the importance of community involvement and giving back to the profession of dentistry.

The demographics of the Class of 2027 include: • The 109 class members were admitted from 1,656 applicants.

• Continuing a trend at dental schools in recent years, significantly more entering 24 STUDENTS M Dentistry | Fall 2023

First-year student Cassidy Diehl navigates putting on her White Coat with a smile and the help of Di Xie, a D4 who assisted during the White Coat Ceremony in late July.

students are women (65) than men (44) in what has been historically a male-dominated profession prior to the passage of federal Title IX legislation in the 1970s.

D1s Samantha Banning (left) and Zahrah Bennett watch as second-year student James Bennett checks one of Banning’s dental instruments on Day 2 of Orientation.

• 60 class members are from Michigan and 49 are from out-of-state.

• Michigan universities represented in the students’ undergraduate preparation are the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, University of Michigan, Dearborn, Michigan State University, Wayne State University, Grand Valley State University, Hope College, Calvin College, Central Michigan University, Oakland University, Alma College, Aquinas College, Eastern Michigan University, Ferris State University, Northern Michigan University, Saginaw Valley State University.

• Students in the class also graduated from colleges and universities in these states from coast to coast: Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Washington and Wisconsin. One student graduated from a university in Canada.

Incoming class member Jack Nawrocki sorts through his dental instruments at his Simulation Lab bench with the help of second-year student Megan Packer.

• 14 percent of the class are first-generation college students.

• The undergraduate Grade Point Average of the class is 3.81.

See Related Videos https://myumi.ch/m7yqG https://myumi.ch/qGDnZ

Recreating Another Four-Generation Family Photo First-year DDS student Brendan Elliott is from a family in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula that has a four-generation connection to the U-M dental school.

Brendan’s ties are on his mother’s side of his family tree, which looks like this: • Brendan’s great-grandfather, Thomas F. Robinson, graduated from U-M with a DDS in 1932 and practiced in Sault Ste. Marie.

• Brendan’s grandfather, Thomas G. Robinson, earned a DDS in 1964 and an MS in orthodontics in 1966, and practiced with his father in the Sault.

• Thomas G.’s son, T.J. Robinson, who is Brendan’s uncle, earned his DDS in 1996 and his MS in ortho in 2002. He practices in Findlay, Ohio, and is an adjunct faculty member at the dental school. T.J. is the brother of Brendan’s mother Jill.

Brendan grew up in Sault Ste. Marie and visited his grandfather’s dental practice often, so he was always aware of the family’s dentistry history.

“It seems to run in the family,” he says, flashing a smile with his intentional understatement.

But he was also a talented hockey player who considered pursuing the puck as a profession.

“What it took for me was to sit down and make a decision. I needed to know what I was going to do after hockey. Once I really sat down and thought through it, dentistry was the right choice.”

Send Us Your News!

Above: After the White Coat Ceremony in July, DDS student Brendan Elliott holds a photograph of his great-grandfather, Thomas L. Robinson. Brendan’s grandfather, Thomas G. Robinson, and his uncle, T.J. Robinson, complete the four generations of U-M dentistry. This pose replicates a photo (at left) taken after the 2018 White Coat Ceremony and previously published on the dental school website. It shows Brendan’s cousin Kiera Robinson Powell enacting the same four-generation photo with her father, T.J., and grandfather.

Contact: We want to hear from you.

SODalumnirelations@umich.edu Send us news about your University of Michigan | School of Dentistry achievements, awards or honors. 1011 N. University | Ann Arbor, MI 48109 STUDENTS 25 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

Leo Merle unfurls the American flag after winning the 1,500 run at the 2023 Parapan American Games in Santiago, Chile, in November. (Photo by Joe Kusumoto/U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee)

Gold Medal Success May Lead to 2024 Paralympics

DDS student Leo Merle is a world-class runner in the para athletics arena Fourth-year DDS student Leo Merle is focused on finishing his final year of dental school with graduation next spring, but it’s not the only finish line that’s important to him these days.

Merle is a world-class para athlete who competed internationally twice this year in the 1,500-meter run for the U.S. national para athletic team. In November, he took first place and the gold medal in the 1,500 meters at the 2023 Parapan Am Games in Santiago, Chile. In July, at the Para World Championships in Paris, France, Merle set the U.S. record for the 1,500 meters while finishing fourth.

26 STUDENTS M Dentistry | Fall 2023

Those two races are part of a qualifying process that could lead to Merle competing in the Paralympics that immediately follow the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris next August. It will depend on his times compared to other athletes across the country and around the world as Team USA sets its roster closer to the Olympics.

Merle qualifies to compete in the para arena because he was born with a form of cerebral palsy that affects flexibility in his right foot and leg. From the time he was a baby until he was six years old, he wore a corrective boot designed to stretch the tendons of his right leg so they would develop properly and

maintain their flexibility. To stay active, he played sports growing up, including running on the track team in high school and in college at the University of California at Santa Cruz, but he was never among the top runners on the teams.

In 2019, after his junior year of college, Merle made a discovery about para athletics that opened an incredible new chapter in his life. He learned that the international para athletic movement has a wide range of categories for athletes with physical limitations, including those with cerebral palsy.

Para athletics has gained widespread recognition in recent years thanks in large part to

television coverage of the Paralympics that follow the Olympics every four years. The most prominent para athletes are those who compete in wheelchairs and amputees who run with prosthetic “blades” for sprints and longer races. However, para athletics offers many categories for athletes with a wide range of disabilities, including those with cerebral palsy, spinal injuries, visual impairments and intellectual disabilities.

Athletes must qualify for para competition.

Merle, who describes his form of cerebral palsy as mild, said para officials examine competitors to determine the tightness of their muscles and tendons and how much flexure the muscles have. Merle was certified to run the 1,500 meters in a classification called T-38, for people with similar cerebral palsy impairment.

Officials had even better news when they learned of Merle’s best time in the 1,500 meters while competing on his college track team. They told him that if he replicated that time at a sanctioned event, he would likely qualify for the U.S. national para athletic team. He did, and now has run competitively at the two major international competitions.

His American record time, set at the Paris race in July when he finished fourth, is 4:06.13. He wasn’t quite as fast in Chile when he finished in first place with a time of

Leo Merle (center) on the podium in Santiago during the playing of the National Anthem for his 1st-place finish. (Photo by Joe Kusumoto/U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee) 4:12.62. His main goal beyond qualifying for the Paralympics is to become the first para athlete to run the 1,500 meters under 4 minutes.

Leo Merle (second from right) during the 1,500-meter run at the Para World Championships in Paris, France in July. (Photo by Marcus Hartmann/U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee)

His running goals keep him training yearround in Ann Arbor, in between his dental school responsibilities. He views running as a healthy break from dentistry, and dentistry keeps him from becoming obsessive about the running. Dating to when he first started running in junior high, he has always considered running fun and even a passion, but he has always refused to make it such a pressure-packed activity that it loses its appeal. Even with his newfound world-class running prowess, he makes it a point to frequently say that dentistry comes first and running is second.

When he was around other para athletes at national meets, he noticed that many have made training for their event almost their entire lifestyle. When they didn’t win nationally or qualify for world events, some seemed devastated. “I’m in the lucky situation where running isn’t my life. It isn’t the only thing I’m doing,” he says. “A lot of people at nationals, all they do is run or throw or jump, and they didn’t make the world championships.

All they did is train for that. But running’s not my primary thing. Dentistry is.”

STUDENTS 27 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

ALUMNI

Alumni Profile: Shortt Family's 4th DDS Generation Adding the next generation of dentists to a family dental practice is an interesting mix. It’s rewarding and enlightening, with a few challenges thrown in, for both the long-established parents and their newly arrived children.

That’s the consensus of the William and Therese Shortt family of South Lyon, Michigan, who say their transition has been fun and successful. Like the many dentists whose children follow their career path, the Shortts had talked for years about the possibility of their son Christian joining the practice. Then the day arrived when Christian graduated from the University of Michigan School of Dentistry in 2022. And so did his wife Juhi. It was a package deal.

Bill and Therese earned their DDS degrees from U-M in 1987 and started a practice in South Lyon. For many years, Bill also commuted two days a week (by plane, he’s a pilot) to his hometown of West Branch, 28 ALUMNI M Dentistry | Fall 2023

Michigan, to practice part-time with his father Lee, a 1944 U-M dental school grad.

Lee had also followed his father, Chauncey, a University of Chicago dental graduate who opened the practice in West Branch in 1908. So Bill says he was well-versed in the pluses and minuses of following the previous generation in the same dental practice.

“It is hard to work for your family,” Bill said. “When my father went through dental school, there were no alternative methods.

It was: this is how you do it. And that’s not how I did it. I learned a ton from him, but we butted heads a lot, too. So I think I understand that I needed to give Christian and Juhi space. I don’t think I’ve ever initiated a ‘this is how you should do this’ conversation.

If they ask me something, I would say, ‘Well, here is what I see. You have to decide how it works in your hands.’ What works in my hands does not work in Therese’s hands, and what works in her hands does not work in my hands.”

Christian said he and his parents had discussed that maybe an option was starting his career elsewhere, then joining the family practice after a few years. But finishing dental school during the COVID-19 pandemic added a new element that complicated the practice of dentistry, particularly for beginning dentists. “As an associate you need a mentor,” Christian said. “In the first couple of months, as prepared as we were, I don’t think anyone coming out of dental school is completely ready to go. There were times when I was looking at an x-ray that I needed a second and third opinion. Or I’d be doing an endo tooth and I’d get advice from one of the two. Being here made a nightand-day difference in our production, in our success rate of procedures. Coming here was for sure the right choice.”

Christian and Juhi met in the first weeks of dental school and were married between their third and fourth years. (Similarly, Bill and Therese met in their first year and were

Left: Four University of Michigan School of Dentistry diplomas grace the waiting room at Shortt Dental in South Lyon. Bill and Therese (at left) are 1987 graduates who have been joined by their son and daughter-in-law Christian and Juhi, who are 2022 graduates.

married after their second.) Juhi said working with her in-laws has been an easy transition. “They do an incredible job giving us the independence and allowing us to do what we think is necessary in a patient situation,” Juhi said. “They make it very well known that they are there any second we need them, but they always give us a chance to do it ourselves. Because nobody practices the same. They know that, we know that. But we all know that we can always help each other out.”

As Christian was growing up, he spent a lot of time at his parents’ practice, and that familiarity is now on his list of pros and cons of joining the practice. “Probably the biggest con to working in this practice is that half these patients have seen me grow up,” he said. “They see me as the little four-year-old running around the office when they were getting their teeth cleaned. So everybody likes to call me Little Bill or Mini Therese or something along those lines. At first, they were a little bit hesitant to get treatment from me, to be honest, because they were like, ‘I saw you in diapers. You’re a dentist now?’

It was a little bit of a transition but we’re finally starting to get past that. They’re not referring to me as the young doctor anymore, they’re just referring to me as a doctor.”

Therese’s adjustment to her role as parentdentist is complicated by the fact that she is a longtime adjunct faculty member at the dental school. She is recognized around the student clinics as a generous and articulate instructor with an easygoing manner of advising about dental procedures and offering encouragement. But when it’s mom advising son, there can be moments.

“It’s really hard sometimes,” she says, recounting a look she sometimes receives from Christian, leading her to reply, “OK, I want to teach you something, but you are glaring at me.”

Bill puts it this way, emphasizing his respect by saying it twice: “Therese is a teacher. I mean, she is a teacher.” He adds: “For her

to step back and realize that they are not her students anymore, they are her colleagues, that was probably the hardest transition for everybody. Therese’s world is very exact.”

The line, like many during an hour-long family interview, draws a round of warm, shared laughter among the four.

Therese said her approaches to dental care and instructing are a result of the faculty she and Bill learned from during their dental school era. “There was what was recognized as the ‘Michigan experience.’ We probably had too much of that back then, but it was about excellence. You were taught by the best of the best and you were held accountable by the best of the best. There’s a level of excellence that you are supposed to have.”

Beyond that insistence on top dental care, Therese said a surprising element of the transition to the next generation is that she can no longer share as many insider family stories with her patients. “I’d say the hardest part has been that our schtick for 35 years in practice was that my close patients know everything about my family. That was part of the humor – when funny and stupid things would happen and I could talk about it. It is super-hard for me now because I can’t tell anything about Christian and Juhi because they are now dentists here. Part of my schtick was my patients loved hearing the stories. Now, oops, I can’t tell that. I have to remember they are professionals and I can’t talk about that stuff any more. I have to stick to our other two kids,” she said, referring to their other two adult children, Derek and Madeline, who chose non-dentistry careers.

At the year and a half mark after Christian and Juhi joined the practice, the transition is going well and they are gradually logging more days as the only dentists in the South Lyon office. Bill has cut back his practicing to two days a week in South Lyon and one day in West Branch. Those flights to his hometown, which he has been making for 37 years, keep him close to the legacy of his grandfather and father – the first two generations of what is now four generations of Shortts who have practiced dentistry.

As he watches Christian and Juhi become more involved in all aspects of Shortt Dental, Bill reflects on how that process worked for him. “Hopefully, I’ve made it easier for them. I went through that transition with my father. I was the little kid running around the dental office in diapers and so I was Little Billy with all the patients. I saw that transition change with patients where at first I was just the son, then I was a dentist, and then it was, ‘oh, he’s the boss.’ So I’m seeing that same transition happening now with these two and it’s really cool.”

Adjunct faculty member Dr. Therese Shortt confers with D3 Rachel Rangel Paradela as they treat a patient in a dental school clinic.

ALUMNI 29 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

Bill Shortt (bottom) makes a pass over the Mackinac Bridge in his L-39 jet with another vintage aircraft during a practice run before an air show. His Michigan winged helmet is visible under the cockpit canopy.

The Flying Dentist: Dr. Bill Shortt is much more than a casual pilot Dr. Bill Shortt has mixed dentistry and aviation for most of his life, but his love of flying soared to a new level two years ago when he bought a vintage military jet and began performing in air shows.

Shortt, 62, grew up in West Branch, Michigan, the son of a dentist who owned an airplane. He shared his father’s love of flying from an early age, earning his pilot’s license at age 17 and becoming a flight instructor at 21. He dreamed of being a military fighter pilot, but opted instead for a career in dentistry.

Being a dentist has not kept him from being airborne. He and his wife Therese have 30 ALUMNI M Dentistry | Fall 2023

practiced dentistry in South Lyon, Michigan, since they graduated from U-M in 1987.

From the start, Bill also worked part-time at his father’s dental office in West Branch.

Two days a week, Bill would climb into his small plane and fly the 140 miles north to West Branch, then return that evening. Even after his father retired, he continued the aerial commute and has done so for 37 years, although he recently reduced his practice schedule to one day a week in West Branch and two in South Lyon.

The commutes to West Branch are only part of Shortt’s extensive flying portfolio and certifications in many types of planes. He

has always owned a general aviation plane, upgrading to better models over the years, for the West Branch commute and family trips around the country. He also has nearly always owned a second plane, more for fun than utility, including a float plane and a T-28 Trojan, a 1950s-era military trainer aircraft used by the U.S. Air Force and Navy.

Shortt took the second plane tradition to a much higher level two years ago when he purchased an Aero L-39 Albatross, which is a Czechoslovakian-produced, single-engine jet designed as a light-attack fighter plane.

Several countries, primarily in Eastern Europe, still use the plane in their militaries

after its initial production run-up in the early 1970s. It also is one of the most widely used training jets in the world, notable for its comparatively simple design and controls that help introduce pilots to flying jets. In recent decades, vintage versions of the plane have become popular with private owners who are part of a small but tightly connected community of pilots who fly and maintain various types of historic “warbirds.”

Shortly after being certified by the Federal Aviation Administration to fly the L-39, Shortt accepted an invitation to join a group of L-39 pilots who do formation flying and aerobatics at air shows around the country.

It requires extensive training, practice and additional FAA certifications.

“From day one, I was hooked,” Shortt said of his first practices for formation flying. “It was: oh, my gosh, this is the greatest thing ever. Flying three feet off of somebody else’s wing. And you take off together and land together, doing aerobatics in formation. I think I had a bit of a knack for it. And I’m telling you that, other than being a parent, it is the coolest thing I have ever done. It is just so much fun.”

His regular group of up to six pilots perform as the Czech Mate Demo Team, a nod to the country of origin for their L-39s. The other pilots are from Michigan and adjoining states, but Shortt sometimes fills in for demo teams based as far away as Texas when they have a pilot who can’t make an air show. The demo team meticulously plots their aerobatic flying sequence for each performance at a sort of ground-school discussion, then go airborne to practice and make sure the maneuvers flow perfectly.

Shortt has already performed at numerous air shows around the country, including the renowned, week-long event in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, as well as Traverse City and Flint in Michigan. Large photos on the walls of the South Lyon dental office show Shortt and his L-39 flying in close formations, sometimes with two or three aircraft, often with nine or ten in a squadron. The gallery includes The Sleeping Bear Dunes along Lake Michigan provide the backdrop as Bill Shortt (center) logs practice time in his L-39 jet before an air show in Traverse City in 2023.

Serving as a backdrop for the dental equipment in every room at Shortt Dental are photos from Bill Shortt's aviation adventures. In the photos behind him, he is flying his L-39 jet in various formations with other members of his demonstration team that performs at air shows.

Shortt’s plane and his teammates zooming above scenic shorelines, the Mackinac Bridge and the Sleeping Bear Dunes during practice flights.

The dark navy-and-gray camouflage paint pattern of Shortt’s L-39 makes it look like a working military jet, but there are a couple of hints that it is his private plane.

His pilot’s helmet, which is visible through the canopy when he’s flying, is a replica of

the distinctive winged helmets worn by his beloved Michigan football team. And when the plane is viewed from below or when it banks, the university’s Block M logos are revealed on the underside of each wing.

It’s not lost on Shortt that he is lucky to have both a successful dentistry career and the opportunity to log an astounding total of nearly 15,000 hours of flight over his lifetime. Even as he has pulled back a bit on his dentistry practice and embraced his new-found passion for aerobatics, he wants his patients to know that he isn’t retiring anytime soon. “I’ve always absolutely loved dentistry. If I didn’t absolutely love it, I would have stopped doing it a long time ago. I still love it,” he says.

It’s the same sentiment he brings to flying. He observes that he never made it to the military to be a fighter pilot, but all these years later he is now fortunate to be doing air show performances not unlike the Navy Blue Angels and the Air Force Thunderbirds. “I’m flying jets and I never had to do a push-up,” he says with a broad smile.

ALUMNI 31 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

Back Home: Reunion Weekend Generates Honors, Fun Dentists and dental hygienists who graduated from the University of Michigan School of Dentistry returned for the annual Reunion Weekend in November to share countless memories and catch up on the lives of their classmates and friends.

Alumni celebrating the 50th anniversary of their graduation in the Class of 1973 received a special tribute during the weekend’s festivities at a program led by Dean Jacques Nör at the Michigan League. About 50 dentists and hygienists in the class were presented with a University of Michigan emeritus pin and personalized School of Dentistry emeritus medallion.

The emeritus ceremony was followed by a luncheon attended by about 130 alumni, guests and family members of those honored by the school during its annual Hall of Honor induction and presentation of its Distinguished Service Awards.

Dr. Thomas Doerr (right), of Hilton Head, South Carolina, spoke about his father Robert Doerr, who joined the school’s Hall of Honor. Also representing the family was one of Rober Doerr’s grandsons, Christian Parker (center) of Nashville, Tennessee, pictured with Dean Jacques Nör

Also during the weekend, about 150 alumni and guests attended a Friday evening cocktail reception, also at the League. Alumni from all classes were welcomed “back home” to their U-M roots with a student DJ, School of Dentistry photo backdrop and plenty of revelry. The Class of 1998 had the largest contingent in attendance. Earlier Friday, alumni could attend a Continuing Education course.

Rounding out the reunion event on Saturday, about 100 alumni and their guests were served breakfast and toured the School of Dentistry to see the major Blue Renew renovation and addition completed last year.

Groups of alumni were led on building tours by faculty, staff and student guides.

In addition to seeing the new state-of-theart facilities and clinics, alumni delighted in finding their historical class composite photos from their graduation year. Exhibits at the Sindecuse Museum of Dentistry were also a popular stop.

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Dental Hygiene award-winner Ginny Przygocki (center) is congratulated by Dean Jacques Nör and her sister, Susan Zurvalec of Brighton, Michigan, who provided the introduction.

Hall of Honor Award: The Hall of Honor Award is presented posthumously by the school’s Alumni Society Board of Governors to recognize and honor individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the profession of dentistry.

Nominees must be a graduate of the DDS, Dental Hygiene, MS or PhD programs, a faculty member or a research staff member.

Since the Hall of Honor was created in 2003, 54 people have been honored with a plaque on the ground floor of the Kellogg Building at the school. This year’s honoree is Dr. Robert Doerr, who earned his DDS in 1950 and his MS in Operative Dentistry in 1953.

He joined the dental school as an instructor shortly after graduation in 1950 and he moved steadily through faculty promotions, reaching the rank of professor in 1961 and beginning a two-decade tenure as Associate Dean in 1962. He served as Interim Dean from 1981-82. By the time he retired at the end of 1986, he had been a leader at the dental school for 36 years and his CV was a remarkably long list of local, state and national service to dentistry.

Dean Jacques Nör with Distinguished Service recipient Dr. Sharon Brooks (center), who was introduced by Dr. Marilyn Woolfolk, Professor Emerita and Assistant Dean Emerita for Student Services.

Distinguished Service Award: The School of Dentistry Board of Governors Distinguished Service Award was created to give appropriate recognition and honor to individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the profession of dentistry.

The 2023 recipient is Dr. Sharon Brooks, who earned her DDS at the School of Dentistry in 1973. She graduated on a Friday evening and started as a full-time

1 clinical instructor at the dental school on the following Monday. It was the start of a 37-year career culminating in appointments as Professor of Oral Diagnosis and Radiology at the dental school and Associate Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial Radiology at the U-M medical school.

Brooks was cited as an outstanding educator and mentor of students throughout the school who earned an international standing in oral radiology. Sharon and her husband, Dave, who live near Chelsea, Michigan, are longtime financial supporters of the dental school. Their major gifts have established the Dr. Sharon Brooks Fellowship to support graduate students in oral pathology and radiation, as well as the school’s Blue Renew renovation.

1. Student and staff guides ensured that returning alumni would be able to find their way around the recently renovated school during the Saturday morning tour sessions.

2. DDS Class of 1998 classmates (from left) Dr. Tony Cianfarani, Dr. Anil Ralhan and Dr. Dave Lomasney share a laugh during the all-class reception Friday evening during Reunion Weekend.

Outstanding Dental Hygiene Alumni Award: Virginia “Ginny” Przygocki, who earned her BSDH at the dental school in 1976, received the 2023 School of Dentistry Board of Governors Outstanding Dental Hygiene Alumni Award. Przygocki, who lives in Essexville, Michigan, used her dental hygiene degree as a springboard to an expanded and impressive career in health sciences and academia. After practicing full-time with a Saginaw periodontist for three years, she was hired by Delta College to start a new dental hygiene program with two other faculty members. She continued to practice part-time while teaching at Delta full-time for more than 30 years, in both classroom and clinic. She was promoted to DH Director from 1996-2005, then was appointed Chair to lead and manage Delta’s Health and Wellness Division, the largest at the community college, which serves Michigan’s Saginaw, Midland and Bay counties. In 2008, Przygocki was named Dean of Delta’s Career Education and Learning Partnerships.

She managed all career education programs as well at the college library, Teaching and Learning Center, Testing Center, high school dual enrollment programs and occupational advisory committees.

See Related Video https://myumi.ch/gRQ26

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3. A fun and common quest for alumni who returned for the weekend was finding their graduation class composite photos in the hallways of the school.

4. Wolverines with a wolverine: During the Saturday morning dental school tour, DDS Class of 1973 classmates (from left) Dr. David Hancock, Dr. Bill Maas and Dr. Marvin Sonne pose with the wolverine pelt that their class gifted to the School of Dentistry in 1993.

The three alumni said they were impressed by the state-of-the-art clinical facilities completed during the school’s recent Blue Renew renovation, but they also made the effort during the tour to find this longstanding display outside the Faculty Alumni Lounge in the research tower.

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ALUMNI 33 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

Why I Give... Dr. Jordan Brunson (DDS 2006) After Jordan Brunson graduated from the School of Dentistry in 2006, he served three years in the U.S. Army as part of a scholarship program.

He was assigned to Fort Moore in Georgia and remained in the state after his military commitment.

He worked for two years as an associate at a practice before starting his own in Palmetto, a suburb of Atlanta. His practice thrived and he added associates, expanding to other south-suburban Atlanta locations in Zebulon and McDonough. Earlier this year he added a fourth location in nearby Fayetteville at Trilith Studios, a massive movie production complex that includes business, residential and park components.

Success has a way of making people reflect on where they’ve been and who and what contributed along the way. For Brunson, the U-M School of Dentistry is a central element. Brunson is grateful for all aspects

of his dental education at one of the top dental schools in the world, but he believes one of the school’s most important contributions to dentistry and dental education has been its longstanding commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion.

“When you look at the strongest schools, the highest ranked schools, the schools that are world renowned, the schools that do the most and best research, they are diverse schools like the University of Michigan.

With that diversity, you get different ideas, different viewpoints, different world viewpoints, different thought processes, different ways of attacking a problem.

“The schools and businesses that are more diverse are the ones that are going to thrive, the ones that are going to survive, the ones to be first to adapt to new technologies, the first that are going to be at the cutting edge of certain treatments. The others are just going to be followers. At the end of the day, embracing DEI is showing that you are a leader. Are you going to be a leader or a follower?”

Brunson has for several years contributed financially to the dental school’s Dr. Lee Jones Endowment for Dentistry Diversity, which supports programs designed to increase dental school admissions of prospective students from diverse backgrounds. Last spring, Brunson learned that the dental school’s Student National Dental Association chapter needed financial help for its annual graduation banquet, so he wrote a check to cover their expenses.

He’d like to help find a way to endow the event in the future.

Brunson said each alumnus of the dental school needs to make their own decisions about whether to give back to the school financially and how much. However, he has developed a strong belief in what he calls “cutting a crown for U-M.” He explains his reasoning this way: “Your financial giving to the school should be, at a minimum, the cost of a crown in your office. If you are giving, if you look at it, unless you just got out of dental school, you can afford to give the equivalent of a crown.”

Alumni News Two School of Dentistry alumni were installed as new leaders of the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry (AAPD) at the organization’s 2023 General Assembly meeting in Florida last May. Dr. Scott D. Smith (DDS 1986, MS pediatric dentistry 1988) is President-Elect. Smith practices at offices in Denver and Centennial, Colorado, and is an adjunct clinical instructor at the University of Colorado and University of Michigan dental schools. Smith has been active in numerous professional organizations during his career. He is a founding member of the Rose Medical Center Cleft Lip and Palate/Craniofacial Anomalies Team, and he has contributed to the Bright Futures Program with the American Academy of Pediatrics. He has served on the Colorado State Board of Dental Examiners and as an examiner for the Central Regional Dental

34 ALUMNI M Dentistry | Fall 2022

Testing Service. He has contributed his expertise to multiple AAPD councils and committees.

Also at the AAPD conference, Dr. Steven K. Rayes (DDS 1994, MS pediatric dentistry 2003) was named a director on the American Board of Pediatric Dentistry (ABPD). He practices in Norwich, Vermont, and in Lebanon, New Hampshire, where he also teaches and practices at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center. He serves on the Executive Board of the Vermont State Dental Society. He has served as a National Oral Board Examiner for the ABPD and on its Qualifying Examination Committee and Oral Clinical Examination Committee.

Prior to relocating to New England in 2013, Rayes spent many years practicing dentistry in remote parts of Alaska for the state’s native population, working with the Indian

Dr. Scott D. Smith

Dr. Steven K. Rayes

Health Service/US Public Health Service.

He was instrumental in the development of a Pediatric Dental Residency Training Program in cooperation with NYU Lutheran and the Alaska Native Medical Center.

The AAPD has 11,000 members who provide primary care and comprehensive dental specialty treatments for infants, children, adolescents and individuals with special health care needs.

ACOMS Presents Humanitarian Award to Julia Plevnia Dr. Sheila Brown

Dr. Hassan Yehia

Dr. Sheila Brown (DDS 1985) was elected director of the Central Area of The Links, Incorporated at its annual conference in Chicago in July. Brown previously served as vice director and treasurer of the organization. Brown, a former president of the National Dental Association, practices in downtown Chicago, focusing on general and cosmetic dentistry and comprehensive care. The Central Area of The Links is comprised of 3,800 women in 72 communities throughout 17 Midwestern states.

Members contribute more than 225,000 documented community service hours annually by engaging external organizations and partnerships. The parent Links organization is an international, not-for-profit corporation established in 1946 with more than 17,000 professional women in 299 chapters in 41 states and abroad. It is one of the nation’s oldest and largest volunteer service organizations of women committed to enriching and sustaining the culture and economic survival of African Americans and other persons of African ancestry.

Dr. Hassan Yehia (DDS 2013, MS endodontics 2018) has been appointed to the Michigan Board of Dentistry by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. He was appointed for a four-year term expiring in June 2027. He was appointed to represent dentists with health profession specialty certificates for the board. Yehia is the owner of the Endodontic Center in Royal Oak, Michigan. He is an adjunct clinical assistant professor in the school’s graduate endodontics program. The Michigan Board of Dentistry was formed to regulate the practice of dentistry and dental hygiene, authorize dental assistants, and certify specialists in the fields of orthodontics, endodontics, prosthodontics, pediatric dentistry, periodontics, oral and maxillofacial surgery, and oral pathology.

Dr. Mark Adams

Dr. Marilyn Woolfolk

Dr. Mark Adams (DDS 1983, MS in Prosthodontics 1985) has joined the board of the SALT Dental Collective, a dental partnership organization specializing in pediatric dentistry and orthodontics in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Arizona and California. SALT provides doctors with the opportunity to maintain their clinical autonomy by removing the day-to-day business management responsibilities.

Adams, who lives near Denver, Colorado, is in his second four-year term on the Colorado Dental Board, serving as chair beginning in January 2023. Adams was an executive leader with ClearChoice Dental Implant Centers as it grew nationally in recent years.

He also is a major financial contributor to the School of Dentistry, establishing the ASK Leadership Scholarship several years ago.

Dr. Marilyn Woolfolk (DDS 1978, MPH 1982), Professor Emerita of Dentistry and Assistant Dean Emerita for Student Services, received the National Dental Association Life Membership Award during the 110th NDA Annual Convention in New Orleans in July. Dr. Marlon Henderson, the 99th president of NDA, thanked Woolfolk for her continued membership, tireless efforts, support and leadership for the organization.

The American College of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons (ACOMS) presented its prestigious Humanitarian Award to Dr. Julia Plevnia (DDS 2001) at its annual Scientific Conference and Exhibition in May. The award recognizes outstanding philanthropic and humanitarian contributions to humanity by oral and maxillofacial surgeons and celebrates the public spirit of generosity of those who use their skills to give back to society.

Plevnia is one of only 14 people, and the first woman, to receive the ACOMS award since it was established in 1990. It is not an annual ward, instead presented at the discretion of the Board of Directors to recognize “exceptional merit.”

Following 12 years as a U.S. Army dentist and surgeon, Plevnia is now an owner and partner practicing at Dry Creek Oral Surgery with offices in Parker and Englewood, Colorado.

After graduating from the U-M School of Dentistry in 2001, Plevnia was commissioned into the Army and began a series of career advancements that resulted in numerous commendations.

Among her postings was an OMS residency at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, where she treated soldiers wounded in the wars of Iraq and Afghanistan. Following her residency, she was awarded the distinguished Silver Scalpel Award and was asked to teach in the OMS residency program at Walter Reed. Plevnia’s later postings included Fort Lewis, Washington, and Fort Carson, Colorado. After reaching the rank of Colonel, Plevnia transitioned to the Army Reserves and then to the Colorado National Guard as she also began private practice.

ALUMNI 35 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

In Me Barbra (Clelland) Anderson (BSDH 1968), Mountain Springs, Texas, November 16, 2023.

David H. Brown (DDS 1967), Yale, Michigan, Sept. 20, 2023.

Christopher Clifford (DDS 2009), Dexter, Michigan, Sept. 25, 2023.

Vivian (Cesar) Driscoll (DH certificate 1953), Sandy Springs, Georgia, May 21, 2023.

Friends Classmates from the DDS Class of 1976 and family members held one of their annual social events over Labor Day weekend. They’ve held these informal reunions ever since they graduated.

Several of their children who are dentists also join the group, this year bringing the combined years of dentistry in attendance to 338. Kneeling in front: Bill Freccia (DDS 1976). Middle row, from left: Jim Lennan (DDS 1976); Don (DDS 1971, MS

1975) and Sandy (DDS 1976) LaTurno; Sarah Lennan Masterson (DDS 2006); Heather (MS 2005) and Matt Gietzen (DDS 2005). Back row, from left: Tim Gietzen (DDS 1976); Jay Werschky (DDS 1976); Dick Jankowski (DDS 1976); Brandon Jankowski (DDS 2017). Not pictured: Dave Loder (DDS 1976), who left before the photo was taken. Two long-time members of the 1976 group, Jay Roahen and Rick Fox, were unable to attend this year, nor was Jay Werschky’s daughter, Jori Lewis (DDS 2007).

Merci, Docteur Bozell The School of Dentistry received a shout-out in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France, in July from alumnus and adjunct faculty member Dr. Ralph Bozell (DDS 1974) and his wife, Mary.

The couple were on a tour of Paris, London and other European sites with their 12-year-old grandson, Andy Craig, of Plymouth, Michigan.

Bozell is an adjunct clinical professor in the Department of Cariology, Restorative Sciences and Endodontics.

Roger Erbaugh (DDS 1976), Holland, Michigan, May 11, 2023.

Frederick C. Gerhardt (DDS 1957), Harbor Beach, Michigan, July 29, 2023.

Glenn W. Goist (DDS 1965), Prairie Village, Kansas, June 9, 2023.

Michael E. Groch (1970 MS orthodontics), Las Vegas, Nevada, August 24, 2022.

Lawrence “Gene” Hale (DDS 1964), Midland, Mich., Aug. 19, 2023.

Curtis J. Hendrickson (DDS 1968), Green Bay, Wisconsin, Sept. 20, 2023.

Walter C. Kovaleski III (DDS 1967), Mesa, Arizona, Aug. 5, 2023.

James W. Lyle (DDS 1959), Southfield, Michigan, Aug. 16, 2023.

Samuel O. Mallory (DDS 1958), Lansing, Michigan, May 15, 2023.

Marie Jo (DeWitt) McWatters (DH certificate 1958), Grand Rapids, Michigan, Oct. 23, 2023.

Diana (Seagert) Pape (DH certificate 1960), Britton, Michigan, Sept. 20, 2023.

Ann (Collins) Richards (DDS 1977), Novi, Michigan, Nov. 19, 2023.

Alan M. Simons (DDS 1985), West Bloomfield, Michigan, May 25, 2023.

William Simson (DDS 1971), San Carlos, Sonora, Mexico, Aug. 16, 2023.

David “Davey” J. Strawbridge (DDS 1971), St. James City, Florida, Sept. 26, 2023.

David J. Torby (DDS 1974), Farmington Hills, Michigan, Aug. 1, 2023.

Edward C. Williams (MS orthodontics 1954), Midland, Michigan, Sept. 6, 2023.

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Sally (McBride) Williams (BSDH 1951), Naples, Florida, June 15, 2023.

moriam

Dr. James E. Harris, who served as Chair of Orthodontics from 1966-82, died Aug. 4, 2023, in Ann Arbor. Dr. Harris earned his DDS from U-M in 1954, then followed with his MS degree in Genetics and his MS degree in Orthodontics in 1963. During his 16 years as chair of Orthodontics, the program focused on offering the residents excellence in clinical patient-centered training in addition to research. He emphasized the importance of patient care in a supportive environment for students, understanding that each patient must receive individualized diagnosis and treatment. He hired key faculty who shared his vision of the value of research in craniofacial biology and growth for the advancement of the orthodontic profession. He oversaw renovation of the Kellogg Building for the first of the major Orthodontic Clinic renovations. Harris also became well known in the world of anthropology for his cephalometric work on mummified Nubian Egyptian children and then Egyptian royal mummies. He traveled to Egypt regularly to x-ray mummies in the Cairo Museum to study the inheritance of facial and dental features over many generations. One of his most acclaimed discoveries, reported in a New York Times article in 1976, was identifying the mummy of Queen Tiye, who was the grandmother of King Tut. Harris used skull x-rays and an electron probe of a small hair sample to identify her mummy, which had previously been disregarded and unidentified. Dr. Harris bequeathed the James E. Harris Graduate Orthodontic Endowed Student Scholarship Fund for the support of orthodontic residents.

Dr. Dennis Lopatin, a faculty member and administrator at the School of Dentistry for more than 35 years, died Sept. 18, 2023. He was 74. Dr. Lopatin received his bachelor’s, MS and PhD degrees from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He joined the University of Michigan School of Dentistry faculty as assistant professor in 1978, and was promoted to associate professor in 1982 and professor in 1990. He also served as an assistant research scientist (1976-81), associate research scientist (1981-86), and research scientist (1986-90) in the Dental Research Institute. He was vice chair of the Department of Biologic and Materials Sciences from 1998-2001, interim chair of the Department of Periodontics, Prevention, and Geriatrics from 2001-02, and was appointed Senior Associate Dean for the school in 2003. He was instrumental in putting forth the school’s initial capital improvement plan that became the Blue Renew renovation and expansion that launched in 2018.

Dr. Lopatin was internationally recognized for his research on novel therapies for periodontal diseases, the relationships between oral microbiota and the host immune response, and immunodominant stress proteins of P. gingivalis. He frequently secured research funding, published numerous articles in leading peer-reviewed journals, engaged clinical faculty as research partners, and was a frequent manuscript and grant reviewer for several scientific journals and federal agencies. He was responsible for the development of the first formal faculty mentoring program at the school. A gifted teacher, he was an early adopter of innovative technologies to improve faculty-student interactions. He also played a leadership role in the development of emergency preparedness plans at the school, university and national levels. He retired from U-M in 2014.

Dr. Henry “Hal” O’Kray, who taught prosthodontics at the dental school from 1998-2014, died July 24, 2023, in Mason, Ohio. He was 76. Dr. O’Kray earned his DDS at U-M in 1972 and practiced dentistry for 25 years in Litchfield, Michigan. He returned to the U-M dental school to complete an MS in biomaterials in 2001, then joined the faculty as a clinical lecturer. He published research in the Journal of Prosthetic Dentistry about a method for retaining a crown that has come loose without the need to remake the crown. He showed that placing one or two horizontal circumferential grooves into the internal surface of an otherwise properly fit crown increased its retention when re-bonded into place. His personable approach and devotion to teaching were popular with students, who honored him with several teaching awards during his tenure.

ALUMNI 37 Fall 2023 | M Dentistry

1011 N. University Ave. | Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1078

Address Service Requested

Thank You, Donors

Theresa Petronzio DDS Class of 2025

Hometown: Chesterland, Ohio Undergraduate degree: Biology, Ohio State University “This dental school was my No. 1 choice because it has a good reputation, good people, good resources.

I was told about the scholarship when I got the admission call. It helped my decision knowing that I would have a buffer to help with my higher out-ofstate tuition and other costs. Without it, I might have had to stay closer to home rather than experience this new environment and new opportunities. I’m grateful for the donors who make this possible.”