The Obesity Society (TOS) provides exclusive benefits to members, including these online events. Registration information has been provided directly to current members via email.
TOS’s Early Career Committee organized the “Coffee with the Professor”, a monthly series over Zoom where TOS early career and student members can sign up to have a conversation with a leading scientist in TOS. This event is a mentoring and networking opportunity for early career members to ask questions about personal and professional development, career trajectory, or your research in a casual, quaint setting. You don’t need to prepare anything but your coffee or tea. Registration is limited to 15 individuals.
Gitanjali Srivastava, MD
Thursday, December 12, 2024
1:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Gitanjali Srivastava, MD, an Associate Professor of Medicine at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine (VUSOM), is a trailblazer in obesity medicine. As the Chief/Medical Director of Obesity Medicine and Program Director of the Obesity Medicine Fellowship at VUSOM, she spearheads clinical excellence. As Co-Director of the Vanderbilt Weight Loss Clinics at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC), Dr. Srivastava combines compassionate care with cutting-edge research. Board-certified by the American Board of Obesity Medicine, Internal Medicine, and Pediatrics, she is a global authority in obesity medicine. Dr. Srivastava is an internationally recognized obesity medicine educator, researcher, and principal investigator of leading anti-obesity pharmacotherapy clinical trials. Her impactful publications span adolescent pharmacotherapy, outcomes research, and complex obesity cases, including transplant and post-operative weight regain patients. Dr. Srivastava’s innovative insights drive clinical progress. Dr. Srivastava earned her MD at Louisiana State University and completed fellowship training at Harvard Medical School/Massachusetts General Hospital, with residency at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.
Michelle Cardel, PhD, MS, RD, FTOS
Thursday, October 24, 2024
3:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Cardel is a nutrition scientist, registered dietitian, Head of Clinical Research & Nutrition at WeightWatchers and a faculty member at the University of Florida, where she is also a Co-Director for the Center for Integrative Cardiovascular and Metabolic Diseases. At WeightWatchers, Dr. Cardel oversees the company’s clinical trials, nutrition point of view using the latest in nutritional science and works across the organization to translate scientific evidence into member content, programs, and beyond. She is a Fellow of The Obesity Society and has published more than 110 papers in high impact journals. Dr. Cardel has won many awards including the University of Alabama (UAB) Outstanding Woman Award, Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Excellence in Emerging Outcomes Research Award, and UAB’s Young Alumni Rising Star Award.
Akilah Dulin, PhD
Friday, September 6, 2024
2:00 pm Eastern
Akilah Dulin, PhD, is Professor and Chair of the Department of Social, Behavioral, and Population Sciences at Tulane’s School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine and Edward Wisner Endowed Professor. Her research centers on community engaged approaches to understand relationships between multilevel resilience resources, risks, and chronic disease management and to create resilience building interventions for racial and ethnic minority groups. She leverages her expertise to engage in advocacy work to support policies that address structural-level adversities for Black Americans. She has served on the Health Promotion in Communities Study section as an ad hoc reviewer, standing study section member and now chair. In 2024, she Chaired the Society of Behavioral Medicine Annual Meeting, Moving Behavioral Science Upstream. She has an active R01 to implement a dietary intervention with Southeast Asian families, two prior R01s focused on resilience and other NIH and foundation awards. She has a PhD in Medical Sociology from the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Kaja Falkenhain, PhD UBCO
Thursday, August 15, 2024
3:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Kaja Falkenhain is a Postdoctoral Fellow in Clinical Sciences at Pennington Biomedical Research Institute. She earned her undergraduate degree in Cognitive Sciences and Artificial Intelligence, providing a foundation around AI- and ML-based applications and research themes. Her PhD work investigated the effects of endogenous and exogenous ketosis on cardiometabolic health, and employed mHealth technology with integrated biofeedback. Dr. Falkenhain’s overarching research focus is cross-disciplinary human research that investigates the metabolic and physiological effects of nutritional and lifestyle interventions, including the mechanistic underpinnings thereof.
Alexandre Caron, PhD
Tuesday, July 23, 2024
3:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Alexandre Caron holds the Canada Research Chair in Neurometabolic Pharmacology. After obtaining his PhD in Physiology-Endocrinology in 2015, he joined the Center for Hypothalamic Research (University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center) first as a Diabetes Canada Postdoctoral Fellow and then as a Banting Postdoctoral Fellow. His postdoctoral work aimed at understanding how the central leptin-melanocortin system controls adipose metabolic and endocrine functions. In 2019, Dr. Caron received the NIDDK K99/R00 Award to perform studies aimed at better understanding the sympathetic regulation of liver metabolism. In 2020, he was appointed Assistant Professor in Pharmacy at Laval University. His research is based on the conceptual framework that metabolic diseases result from alterations in the nervous system. His laboratory studies the pathophysiological mechanisms that alter brain-organs communication in metabolic diseases and aims to identify new molecular and pharmacological targets to improve energy and glucose metabolism.
Carmen T. Monthe-Dreze, MD
Monday, June 24, 2024
4:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Monthé-Drèze is an attending neonatologist and faculty in the Department of Pediatrics at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and an Instructor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. In addition to caring for sick neonates in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, Dr. Monthé-Drèze conducts clinical and translational research on the effects of pre-pregnancy obesity on child health. Her specific interests lie in investigating underpinnings of child obesity and adverse neurodevelopment observed in children of mothers with high body mass index, with a focus on dysmetabolism in pregnancy. Given the critical role of neurobiology in obesity development, Dr. Monthé-Drèze’s long-term goal is to define neurobiobehavioral mechanisms of intergenerational obesity during the first 1,000 days, a sensitive period for obesity development in children. She hopes this novel approach to understanding intergenerational obesity will translate into new targets for interventions in early life to improve child health.
Her research activities have been supported by the American Academics of Pediatrics, The National Institutes of Health, the Nutrition Obesity Research Center at Harvard, and the Harvard Medical School Diversity and Inclusion Community Partnership Faculty Fellowship. In addition to her research activities, Dr. Monthé-Drèze co-directs the Inter-NORC Speaking Scholar Initiative (INSPIRE) Program, an NIDDK-sponsored national initiative which aims to promote the career of early career scientists working in obesity, nutrition, and metabolism research. Dr. Monthé-Drèze is originally from Cameroon (Central Africa). She received her undergraduate degree in Biology and Child Psychology from Swarthmore College and her Medical Degree from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. She completed her residency in Pediatrics and fellowship in Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine at the Boston Children’s Hospital/Harvard Combined programs.
Anthony N. Fabricatore, PhD, FTOS
Monday, May 20, 2024
12:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Fabricatore is a licensed psychologist with experience in both academic and industry settings. He is currently Medical Director in Medical Affairs, Obesity, at Novo Nordisk, Inc., where his work includes, e.g., provision of subject matter expertise to cross-functional projects, guiding and executing scientific training, and contributing to clinical trial design. Previous industry positions include Medical Science Liaison at Novo Nordisk and VP, Research and Development at Nutrisystem. His career began at the Center for Weight and Eating Disorders at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine where, as Assistant Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry, his clinical and research efforts addressed various aspects of obesity assessment and management.
R. Scott Rector, PhD, FTOS, FACSM
Thursday, April 11, 2024
11:00 am Eastern
Professor Rector is currently an Associate Professor (with tenure) with Co-appointments in Nutrition and Exercise Physiology and Medicine-Gastroenterology and Hepatology at the University of Missouri School of Medicine. Dr. Rector is the Director of NextGen Precision Health and a Research Health Scientist at the Harry S Truman Memorial VA Hospital.
Dr. Rector at the University of Missouri is a researcher focused on chronic diseases like obesity, type 2 diabetes, and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). His lab uses a translational approach, examining factors triggering disease progression and effective treatment strategies. He is studying nutritional, lifestyle, and pharmacological interventions in animal models and humans to combat the NAFLD epidemic. His findings have led to a better understanding of the importance of physical activity and fitness in NAFLD prevention and treatment. His work is supported by industry and federal grants.
Karen D. Corbin, PhD, RD
Wednesday, March 13, 2024
12:00 pm Eastern
Karen D. Corbin, PhD, RD is a clinical-translational scientist at the AdventHealth Translational Research Institute (TRI) and the Founder and Chief Geek of Geeks That Speak®.
Dr. Corbin’s scientific career is focused on human nutrition and metabolism. In particular, she explores the mechanisms, such as the gut microbiome, that drive individual susceptibility to metabolic diseases such as non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), diabetes and obesity. Her research portfolio includes both investigator-initiated and industry clinical-translational studies focused on novel pathogenic mechanisms and therapeutics.
Dr. Corbin, a researcher and dietitian, joined the TRI after a 3-year tenure as a Research Assistant Professor at UNC Chapel Hill. She conducted research on individual nutrient requirements and metabolic disease. Dr. Corbin holds a doctorate in molecular medicine and a Bachelor’s degree in Nutrition and Food Science. She believes that by helping scientists communicate complex scientific information, she can contribute to innovation and solve society’s most pressing problems. She founded Geeks That Speak® to empower scientists.
Ellen A. Schur, MD, MS
Wednesday, February 14, 2024
4:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Schur, a Stanford Medical School MD and a University of Washington internal medicine residency, is a Professor in the Department of Medicine and Clinical Research Director of the UW Medicine Diabetes Institute and the University of Washington Nutrition and Obesity Research Center. She specializes in obesity medicine at the UW Medicine Center for Weight Loss and Metabolic Surgery. Dr. Schur’s research focuses on eating behavior, obesity, and cardiometabolic disease risk in humans, elucidating genetic, physiological, and neurological factors driving food consumption. She regularly gives invited lectures and presentations nationally and has published in various journals. Dr. Schur has served as Principal Investigator of research awards from the National Institutes of Health and American Diabetes Association. Her current research uses functional and structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques to investigate brain regulation of appetite and hypothalamic inflammation’s relation to obesity and type 2 diabetes pathogenesis and treatment.
Michael D. Jensen, MD
Wednesday, January 17, 2024
12:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Jensen is an endocrinologist whose clinical interests are primarily focused on obesity and diabetes. Dr. Jensen’s research involves the study of human body fat distribution, and fatty acid/energy metabolism, focusing specifically on the effect’s obesity and body-fat distribution on health. He served as co-chair of the NHLBI Expert Panel on the Identification, Evaluation, and Treatment of Overweight and Obesity in Adults, 2008-2013 and is the current editor-in-chief of Obesity.
Jack A. Yanovski, MD, PhD
Wednesday, December 13, 2023
3:00 pm Eastern
Jack Yanovski, Chief of the Section on Growth and Obesity and Associate Scientific Director for Translational Medicine at the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, is a leading expert in pediatric obesity. He earned his MD and PhD from the University of Pennsylvania and completed residency training in Pediatrics and Pediatric Endocrinology at the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Yanovski founded the NIH’s Section on Growth and Obesity in response to the growing issue of pediatric obesity in the US. He has conducted numerous clinical studies on the evaluation and treatment of overweight and obesity in children and adults, as well as laboratory investigations into molecular etiologies. Dr. Yanovski has authored over 350 published manuscripts and has received numerous awards for his research on obesity.
Stephanie Compton, PhD, RD
Wednesday, November 15, 2023
2:00 pm Eastern
Stephanie Compton, PhD, RD is a postdoctoral fellow in the Cancer Metabolism Program at Pennington Biomedical Research Center. Dr. Compton’s research focuses on the intersections of nutrition, physical activity, and metabolism on clinical cancer outcomes and survivorship. Her current studies are investigating the impact of side effects of cancer treatment on metabolic flexibility, energy metabolism, and glucose regulation. Dr. Compton has been engaged in science communication via social media for over 5 years, bridging the gap between science and real life to educate about nutrition and her research. She also educates on filtering online nutrition information, shares science education for health professionals, and demystifies research to her audience of over 13,000 followers in Instagram. Dr. Compton has spoken to both scientific and public audiences about science communication and disseminating nutrition science online.
Jamy D. Ard, MD
Thursday, September 14, 2023
3:00 pm Eastern
Jamy Ard, M.D. is a Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Prevention and the Department of Medicine at Wake Forest School of Medicine and Vice Dean for Clinical Research. He is also co-director of the Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist Weight Management Center, directing medical weight management programs. Dr. Ard’s research interests include clinical management of obesity and strategies to improve cardiometabolic risk using lifestyle modification. Dr. Ard has more than 25 years of experience in clinical nutrition and obesity. He has served on several expert panels and guideline development committees, including the 2013 AHA/ACC/TOS Guideline Panel on the Identification, Evaluation, and Treatment of Overweight and Obesity in Adults, and the USDA’s 2020 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee. Dr. Ard is currently the president-elect for The Obesity Society.
Samuel Klein, MD
Monday, August 14, 2023
12:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Klein’s primary research involves the use of both basic and clinical research tools to evaluate cellular, regional, and whole-body substrate metabolism to test physiologically and clinically relevant hypotheses in human subjects in vivo. His laboratory is specifically focused on understanding the pathophysiological alterations in metabolic function associated with obesity in people and the mechanisms for weight-loss induced benefits in ameliorating obesity-related metabolic abnormalities.
Christopher Gardner, PhD
Tuesday, July 18, 2023
2:00 pm Eastern
Christopher Gardner is a Professor of Medicine, and the director of Nutrition Studies at the Stanford Prevention Research Center. For 30 years he has been feeding and bleeding human study participant trying to answer health questions about the potential benefits of various nutrients, foods, or food patterns. He has conducted several landmark weight loss diet studies including the A TO Z (2007) and DIETFITS (2018)studies. He is currently chair of the American Heart Association’s Nutrition Committee and is serving on the 2025 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee. Most recently his interests have shifted in two directions. One is to work more in institutional food settings such as universities, hospitals, worksites and schools – which often involves working with chefs and the concept of “unapologetic deliciousness”. The other involves collaborations with Drs. Justin and Erica Sonnenburg – Stanford microbiologists – on the topic of diet and the microbiome.
Angela Odoms-Young, PhD
Monday, June 26, 2023
3:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Angela Odoms-Young is an Associate Professor and Director of the Food and Nutrition Education in Communities Program at Cornell University. Her research centers on understanding the social and structural determinants of dietary behaviors in low-income populations and black, indigenous, and people of color and identifying culturally appropriate programs and policies that promote health equity, food justice, and community resilience. Dr. Odoms-Young has over 20 years’ experience partnering with communities to improve nutrition and health and she has served on numerous advisory committees and boards including the Institute of Medicine committees to revise the food packages provided for WIC, and the Council on Black Health. Dr. Odoms-Young also currently serves as the inaugural Equity Visiting Scholar at Feeding America.
Ursula White, PhD
Tuesday, May 23, 2023
3:00 pm Eastern
Ursula White, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor in Clinical Science at Pennington Biomedical Research Center. She leads a clinical research program that conducts intervention trials to investigate the impact of changes in energy balance, nutrition, and exercise on physiology during obesity and related cardiometabolic disorders in adults. Dr. White’s NIH-funded work also includes a special emphasis on the influence of adipose (fat) tissue distribution and body shape on metabolic health and implements approaches for comprehensive metabolic phenotyping in both the whole-body and the adipose tissue. In addition to her research projects, Dr. White serves as a mentor for initiatives, such as the NSF LS-PAC-MODELS program at Louisiana State University, and as the Director of Peer Mentoring for the NIH-NIDDK U24 grant (LAUNCHED) at Pennington Biomedical. Dr. White is a member of The Obesity Society and is the current Chair of the Annual Program Committee.
Kelly C. Allison, PhD, FAED, FTOS
Friday, April 21, 2023
12:00 pm Eastern
Kelly C. Allison, Ph.D. is a Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and Director of the Center for Weight and Eating Disorders. She is a researcher and a clinician, with over 20 years of experience with NIH-funded trials and clinical trials. Her research interests include the timing of eating, night eating syndrome, binge eating disorder, and the role of weight and eating behaviors on reproductive health. She is also engaged in studies on bariatric surgery outcomes and clinical trials for weight and disordered eating. Dr. Allison enjoys providing psychotherapy related to weight management and disordered eating, and she provides pre-operative bariatric surgery psychological evaluations at Penn Medicine’s bariatric program. Additionally, she provides supervision and mentoring for pre- doctoral psychology externs and interns, medical students, postdoctoral fellows and junior faculty members. Dr. Allison is a Fellow of The Obesity Society and the Academy for Eating Disorders. She has published over 170 peer-reviewed papers and chapters, along with two books.
Jennifer Orlet Fisher, PhD
Thursday, March 23, 2023
11:00 am Eastern
Dr. Jennifer Orlet Fisher is a Professor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Temple University and Associate Director of the Center for Obesity Research and Education. Dr. Fisher’s research seeks to understand influences on the development of eating behaviors and weight outcomes during early childhood. Dr. Fisher was the 2019 Oded Bar-Or Award for Excellence in Pediatric Obesity Research from The Obesity Society. She recently served as Chair of a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Healthy Eating Research expert panel to develop evidenced-based guidelines for promoting healthy eating behaviors in children. She earned a master’s degree in Nutritional Sciences from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and PhD in Nutrition from Pennsylvania State University. Dr. Fisher currently serves on several editorial boards and on the 2025 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee.
Alison E. Field, ScD
Thursday, February 23, 2023
12:00 pm Eastern
Alison E. Field, ScD is a Professor of Epidemiology and the Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs at the Brown University School of Public Health. She has been conducting research on obesity and eating disorders for the past 30 years. She helped to establish and later was a Co-Director of the Growing Up Today Study (GUTS), which is the largest cohort study of youth in the US with frequent assessments over more than 20 years of follow-up. Her early research focused on identifying the causes of developing obesity, binge eating, and purging. Much of her current research is focused on phenotyping obesity. Dr. Field has been a member of the Obesity Society since 1998 and has served in numerous leadership positions, including Chair of the Program Committee, Chair of the Obesity Section, Member of Council, Chair of the Ethics Committee, and is now the Vice President. In addition, she is a member of the Eating Disorders Research Society, a Fellow of the Academy for Eating Disorders, and on the Editorial Board for the Journal of Adolescent Health.
Aaron S. Kelly, PhD, FTOS
Monday, January 23, 2023
4:00 pm Eastern
Aaron S. Kelly, PhD, is a Professor of pediatrics, holds the Minnesota American Legion and Auxiliary Chair in Children’s Health, and is co-director of the Center for Pediatric Obesity Medicine at the University of Minnesota Medical School. He has approximately 20 years of experience conducting clinical trials for the treatment of pediatric obesity and has published over 100 peer-reviewed papers on related topics. Dr. Kelly’s NIH-funded research program focuses on treatments targeting the underlying biology of obesity, such as pharmacotherapy and metabolic/bariatric surgery, as supplements to lifestyle modification therapy with the goal of enhancing clinical outcomes in youth struggling with the disease. Dr. Kelly is actively involved in numerous initiatives related to pediatric obesity treatment in the United States and internationally, has held various leadership positions in the Obesity Society and American Heart Association, and is a Fellow of both organizations.
Joseph A. Skelton, MD, MS, FAAP, FTOS
Wednesday, December 7, 2022
4:00 pm Eastern
Joseph A. Skelton, MD, MS, FAAP, FTOS, is a board-certified pediatrician and obesity medicine specialist. He is particularly interested in working with entire families to change behavior and with community organizations with the same goals. Dr. Skelton is the founder and director of Brenner FIT® (Families In Training), a family-based pediatric obesity program active in clinical care, research, education, and community outreach.
Dr. Skelton researches attrition and treatment adherence and how to incorporate the entire family system into health care. In addition, he teaches medical students in a field called Culinary Medicine, a way to improve nutrition and health through cooking.
Peter T. Katzmarzyk, PhD, FTOS
Thursday, October 27, 2022
3:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Katzmarzyk is Professor and Associate Executive Director for Population and Public Health Sciences at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center where he holds the Marie Edana Corcoran Endowed Chair in Pediatric Obesity and Diabetes. Dr. Katzmarzyk is an internationally recognized leader in the field of physical activity and obesity, with a special emphasis on pediatrics and ethnic health disparities. He has over two decades of experience in conducting large clinical and population-based studies in children and adults. Dr. Katzmarzyk has a special interest in global health, and has a record of building research capacity in physical activity and obesity research in developing countries.
Sherry Pagoto, PhD
Tuesday, September 20, 2022
4:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Pagoto is a licensed clinical psychologist, professor, and social media researcher. She is currently a Professor in the Department of Allied Health Sciences at the University of Connecticut and Director of the UConn Center for mHealth and Social Media. She is also the Past-President of the Society of Behavioral Medicine, the leading organization for research at the intersection of behavioral science and health. Her research focuses on leveraging technology in the development and delivery of behavioral interventions targeting diet, physical activity, and cancer prevention. She has developed two mobile apps for weight management and a comprehensive weight loss program that is deliverable via social media platforms.
Leanne Redman, PhD, FTOS and Diana Thomas, PhD
Thursday, August 11, 2022
4:00 pm Eastern
Leanne M. Redman, PhD, FTOS is a Professor of Clinical Science. Her expertise is in human physiology as it relates to the quantification of energy balance, in both controlled and free-living conditions in humans. The epicenter of Dr. Redman’s work has been in the design and conduct of controlled clinical trials where diet and physical activity are manipulated to modulate body energy stores. Dr. Redman is the Chief Academic Officer at Pennington Biomedical and leads the Division of Scientific Education. She has published more than 200 research articles, reviews, and book chapters around energy metabolism, insulin sensitivity, obesity, calorie restriction, exercise, and maternal/infant physiology.
Diana M. Thomas, PhD is currently a professor of discipline at the United States Military Academy at West Point. She holds joint research appointments at the Columbia University New York Obesity Research Center and the Pennington Biomedical Research Center and serves on the editorial board for the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, PloS One, and Nutrition and Diabetes. She has published over 130 peer-reviewed articles in exercise, fitness, nutrition, and body weight regulation relying on diverse mathematical methods ranging from differential equations to machine learning. Dr. Thomas has devoted her career to increasing and diversifying the number of students who pursue mathematics.
Kevin D. Hall, PhD
Monday, July 18, 2022
4:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Kevin Hall received his Ph.D. in Physics from McGill University and is now a tenured Senior Investigator at the National Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), one of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda MD. His main research interests are the regulation of food intake, macronutrient metabolism, energy balance, and body weight. Dr. Hall’s laboratory performs experiments in humans and rodents and develops mathematical models and computer simulations to help design, predict, and interpret the experimental data. Dr. Hall is the recipient of the NIH Director’s Award, the NIDDK Director’s Award, the Lilly Scientific Achievement Award from The Obesity Society, the Guyton Award for Excellence in Integrative Physiology from the American Society of Physiology, and his award-winning Body Weight Planner (http://BWPlanner.niddk.nih.gov) has been used by millions of people to help predict how diet and physical activity dynamically interact to affect human body weight.
Rebecca Puhl, PhD
Tuesday, June 21, 2022
1:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Rebecca Puhl is Deputy Director for the Rudd Center for Food Policy & Health and Professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Sciences at UConn. Dr. Puhl is responsible for identifying and coordinating research and policy efforts aimed at reducing weight bias. Dr. Puhl earned her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Yale University. She has conducted research on weight bias for 20 years and has published over 140 studies on weight-based bullying in youth, weight bias in health care and the media, interventions to reduce weight bias, and the impact of weight stigma on emotional and physical health. Dr. Puhl is a leading national expert in the field of weight bias, and her research is routinely publicized in national and international media. She has been recognized for her research with national awards including the Excellence in Policy Research Award from the National Eating Disorders Coalition, and The Obesity Society Scientific Achievement Award for excellence in an established research career.
Jeffrey Zigman, MD, PhD
Wednesday, April 20, 2022
4:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Zigman is a Professor of Internal Medicine at UT Southwestern, where he is affiliated with the Center for Hypothalamic Research, the Division of Endocrinology & Metabolism, and the Peter O’Donnell Jr. Brain Institute. Dr. Zigman’s research is geared toward understanding the neuro-hormonal framework underlying metabolism. In particular, the Zigman lab focuses on how gastrointestinal hormones such as ghrelin and LEAP2 interact with the brain, peripheral nervous system, and various peripheral organs such as the pancreatic islet and pituitary to control eating, body weight, blood glucose, responses to exercise, and mood. Conditions studied by the lab include obesity, diabetes, hypoglycemia, cachexia, Prader-Willi Syndrome, and depression.
John Jakicic, PhD
Tuesday, March 15, 2022
4:00 pm Eastern
John Jakicic, PhD serves as the Director of Population Science, building research programs focused on obesity, weight loss, and physical activity in cancer. Dr. Jakicic has a long history of investigating lifestyle behaviors in chronic health conditions like obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer. In addition, he has recently investigated aging and brain health and the intersection between behavior and physiology. Dr. Jakicic has published >250 peer-reviewed papers, review articles, and book chapters and has served on several Editorial Boards and grant review panels for the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Jakicic obtained a BS in Physical Education and Health and an MS in Exercise Science from Slippery Rock University and received a PhD in Exercise Physiology from the University of Pittsburgh. Before taking his director role at AdventHealth Translational Research Institute, he was a distinguished professor at the University of Pittsburgh.
Susan Yanovski, MD and Robert Rivers, PhD
Monday, February 14, 2022
3:00 pm Eastern
Susan Z. Yanovski, MD, serves as co-director of the Office of Obesity Research at the NIDDK, and as Senior Scientific Advisor for Clinical Obesity Research. Her primary responsibilities are to coordinate obesity-related research activities across the Institute, including basic and clinical studies that lead to innovative prevention and treatment strategies, and to serve as scientific lead for obesity within the Division of Digestive Diseases and Nutrition.
Robert Rivers, PhD, is a program director in the Office of Minority Health Research Coordination (OMHRC) at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK). He also leads both the Short-Term Research Experience Program to Unlock Potential (STEP-UP), Diversity F31s, Research Supplements to Promote Diversity in Health Related Research and Supplemental Funding to Promote Re-Entry into Biomedical and Behavioral Research.
Thomas Inge, MD
Friday, January 21, 2022
4:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Tom Inge is professor of surgery and Surgeon-in-Chief at the Ann and Robert Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. His clinical practice has focused on advanced minimally invasive surgery and in particular, his clinical and academic interest in his 16 has been in the surgical care of adolescents with severe obesity. Dr. Inge has been continuously funded by the United States National Institutes of Health (NIH) since 2005, developing an evidence base defining the role of surgery to treat adolescents with clinically severe obesity. He and his team have produced over 150 peer-reviewed publications and book chapters. He has also provided over 140 invited lectures for national and international professional groups. His leadership experience includes prior roles as Chief of Pediatric Surgery and associate Surgeon-in-Chief at Children’s Hospital Colorado.
Delia West, PhD, FTOS
Monday, December 6, 2021
4:00 pm Eastern
Exercise Science Professor and SmartState Endowed Chair of the Technology Center to Promote Healthy Lifestyles (TecHealth) Delia West’s work has focused on developing and evaluating behavioral weight control interventions, including technology-assisted lifestyle interventions. Dr. West has explored the experiences of minority populations engaged in weight control and strategies for addressing binge eating among individuals with obesity. She and colleagues have developed and evaluated online weight control to determine the efficacy of delivery platforms, cost profiles, and strategies to improve outcomes. She has also evaluated the dissemination of an established lifestyle intervention in community settings using lay health educators.
Penny Gordon-Larsen, PhD, FTOS, FAHA
Tuesday, October 19, 2021
4:00 pm Eastern
Penny Gordon-Larsen, PhD, FTOS, FAHA, became the Gilling School’s Associate Dean for Research in September 2018. In this role, she leads a schoolwide research program of approximately $200 million in research funding each year. She provides intellectual and strategic leadership and vision for research programs and supports and enhances the School’s research enterprise. The NIH supports Dr. Gordon-Larsen’s research program. Her portfolio ranges from molecular and genetic to environmental and societal factors that influence health. She served as President of The Obesity Society in 2015 and received the Eli Lilly Scientific Achievement Award from The Obesity Society in 2010.
Kevin L. Grove, PhD
Wednesday, September 8, 2021
11:00 am Eastern
Dr. Grove started his independent academic career as a Staff Scientist at the Oregon National Primate Research Center (ONPRC), OHSU, in 1996. In the past 20 years at ONPRC he rose through the ranks to Senior Scientist and to eventually start and lead the Division of Diabetes, Obesity and Metabolism. In 2014, Dr. Grove joined Novo Nordisk as the Vice President of Obesity Research to establish and develop a new early discovery research program in Seattle, WA to identify novel therapeutic targets for the treatment of obesity and other metabolic disorders. Dr. Grove also maintains an active academic research program at ONPRC/OHSU.
David B. Allison, PhD and Andrew W. Brown, PhD
Thursday, August 5, 2021
1:00 pm Eastern
David B. Allison, PhD, is a Dean and Provost Professor at the Indiana University-Bloomington School of Public Health since 2017. Prof. Allison’s research interests include obesity and nutrition, quantitative genetics, clinical trials, statistical and research methodology, and research rigor and integrity.
Andrew W Brown, PhD, is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Applied Health Science, Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington. Dr. Brown has received local, regional, and national awards and spoken internationally about integrity in research reporting and science communication with respect to nutrition and obesity research.
Fatima Cody Stanford, MD, MPH, MPA, MBA, FTOS
Tuesday, July 13, 2021
4:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Stanford is a fellowship-trained obesity medicine physician at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School. Her clinical interests and expertise focus on the practice of obesity medicine and nutrition. She has evaluated and treated more than 2,000 patients and helped to develop both a standardized approach for the use of weight loss pharmacotherapy for adults and the pediatric treatment program for the MGH Weight Center. She has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles and conducted clinical research across a broad spectrum of topics in clinical and policy in obesity medicine for pediatric and adult patients.
Jacqueline M. Stephens, PhD
Friday, June 4, 2021
10:00 am Eastern
Students and early career members of The Obesity Society (TOS) had the opportunity to hear from Jacqueline Stephens, PhD, during the June session of the “Coffee with Professor” series.
Dr. Stephens study molecular aspects of obesity and Type 2 Diabetes. She has served on the Editorial Boards of several journals, including Obesity, Diabetes, JBC, AJP-Endo and Metabolism, and Adipocytes. She has also served or chaired numerous NIH grant review panels as well as reviewing grants for the UK, Netherlands, Germany, France, and Canada.
Daniel H. Bessesen, MD
Monday, May 10, 2021
11:30 am Eastern
Dr. Bessesen is the program director of the obesity medicine fellowship program at the University of Colorado as well as the Director of the Anschutz Health and Wellness Center on the campus of the University of Colorado, School of Medicine. He has been involved in ‘big data’ studies of pharmacotherapy for obesity in large healthcare organizations. Dr. Bessesen has been a member of TOS since he was a post-doctoral fellow and is currently the president-elect of TOS.
Elizabeth J. Parks, PhD
Friday, April 9, 2021
1:00 pm Eastern
Dr. Elizabeth Parks is currently a tenured professor in the Department of Nutrition and Exercise Physiology, within the Medical School, at the University of Missouri at Columbia. Dr. Parks’ current research studies are investigating how the brain, intestine and liver may communicate through the taste of fat to maintain energy balance and how the dysregulation of lipid metabolism in obesity leads to body-fat gain. Dr. Parks serves on the TOS Governing Board as Vice President and as a spokesperson for the organization.
Eric Ravussin, PhD & Donna Ryan, MD
Thursday, March 11, 2021
10:00 am Eastern
Eric Ravussin, editor-in-chief of Obesity, is a Boyd Professor at Louisiana State University. He received his PhD in human physiology from the University of Lausanne in Switzerland. Ravussin is an internationally recognized translational investigator in obesity and diabetes research.
Ryan, associate editor-in-chief, is Professor Emerita at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La.
Catherine Kotz, PhD
Tuesday, February 9, 2021
4:00 pm Eastern
A leading researcher into the neuroscience of obesity and energy balance, Dr. Catherine Kotz is professor and director of graduate studies at the University of Minnesota’s Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology. She is also associate director of research at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ Geriatric Research Education and Clinical Center in Minneapolis. Dr. Kotz is the current president and a long-time, active member of TOS.