University of Virginia School of Medicine Class of 2026 Breakfast @UVASchoolofMedicine

Uploaded May 2026 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago

It starts here on the steps of the Old Medical School with breakfast. The University of Virginia School of Medicine Class of 2026 gathered this morning for a longstanding tradition before making their way to the Lawn for Commencement. Congratulations, graduates. 🎉

University of Virginia School of Medicine Class of 2026 Breakfast

Jinghang Xie, PhD, shares his innovative imaging research in the field of translational medicine.

University of Virginia School of Medicine 2024 Biomedical Sciences Hooding Ceremony

Kari Ring, MD, shares her insights on the world of cancer genetics.

Jennifer Charlton, MD: Improving Kidney Health in Preterm Babies.

Can We Treat Cancer Differently? Hao Jiang, PhD Thinks So

Larry Borish, MD, What Cold Viruses Teach Us About Asthma.

Clint Miller, PhD: Unlocking the Genetics of Heart Disease.

Mark Okusa, MD. A Revolutionary Approach: Treating Kidney Disease with Ultrasound

J. Nick Brenton, MD, Studies the Environmental Factors That May Impact Multiple Sclerosis.

$Ian Wenker, PhD: Understanding the Brain and Preventing Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy Ian Wenker, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology Transcript What I love is coming in every day here at UVA. Its such a creative process doing research, and I love sharing it with the people I work with, such smart and passionate people here at UVA, both that work for me and those I collaborate with across campus. I also enjoy engaging with the community. I work with a number of patient populations across the country, where they give me a lot of feedback on what were doing and theyre excited about the work we do, which just reinvigorates me to do all that we can every day. My name is Ian Wenker. Im an assistant professor in the anesthesiology department. My overall research focus for years has been understanding how the brain controls automatic processes that we all do, like breathing, cardiovascular function, heart rate, things like that. And right now, a big focus of the lab is trying to understand how the brain contributes to whats called sudden unexpected death in epilepsy. So people with epilepsy-unfortunately some fraction of them- will experience this where theyre found deceased and we dont understand yet why. And so in the lab, we’re trying to understand what the mechanisms of that are. And its still early stages, but weve been making good progress and were hopeful to make an impact. So our work on SUDEP, or sudden unexpected death in epilepsy is basic in that were trying to understand mechanisms that create this fatal complication in epilepsy. And were hopeful that once we understand these mechanisms, we’ll be able to translate them into therapies so that the people who are taking care of those with epilepsy will be able to intervene and save their life, and this will allow them to hopefully sleep better at night and be able to better take care of their loved ones.$

Manoj Patel, PhD, & Hannah Grote, PhD Student—Mentor to Student: Inside UVAs Epilepsy Research Team

UVA - School of Medicine |

University of Virginia School of Medicine Class of 2026 Breakfast