Biomedical engineering chair Jianyi “Jay” Zhang, M.D., Ph.D., is featured for his research on patches for damaged heart muscle cells following heart attacks, in the Summer 2019 issue of UAB Magazine.

The story describes how the university’s $1 billion campaign—successfully reached in late 2018—helps fund lifesaving research. Zhang is creating actual human cardiac muscle patches that attach to a heart’s damaged tissue, helping it regenerate muscle and heal injured cells. A gift to UAB which created the T. Michael and Gillian Goodrich Endowed Chair of Engineering Leadership brought Zhang to Birmingham in 2015.

From the article: “Now his lifesaving patch technology could be in clinical trials by 2023, he says. In studies with animal models, one version of the patch—1.57 by 0.79 inches in size and nearly as thick as a dime—significantly improved heart attack injury and prevented arrhythmia, a serious complication of other treatment approaches.

Along with supporting Zhang’s breakthroughs, the Goodrich endowment has led to other successes for the Department of Biomedical Engineering, a collaboration between the School of Engineering and School of Medicine. In bringing Zhang to UAB, it created new laboratory research opportunities for graduate students and postdoctoral fellows.”