Paul Benson, M
Paul Benson, M.D..D., Autopsy Section Head and professor in the Division of Anatomic Pathology and Nicholas Eisele, D.O., PGY2, Chief Resident of Education and Outreach, were recipients of the 2026 pilot award from the Mary Heersink Institute for Global Health. The goal of the pilot is to catalyze innovation in any mission area that involves collaboration between experienced investigators at UAB and international partners addressing a major global health problem.
The study, titled “A UAB-AHRI Artificial Intelligence Program for Discovery of Novel Tuberculosis Pathology in Human Tissue” was done in collaboration with principal investigator Adrie JC Steyn, Ph.D., in the UAB Department of Microbiology, Sandeep Bodduluri, M.S., Ph.D., UAB Division of Pulmonary, Allergy, and Critical Care Medicine, and Threnesan Naidoo, M.Sc., MBChB, Department of Forensic Medicine, Walter Sisulu University, Umtata, South Africa.
Nicholas Eisele, D.O., PGY2
Benson and Eisele are part of a multi-disciplinary team in conjunction with the Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI) in Durban, South Africa, to use an Artificial Intelligence (AI) model for automated detection and analysis of tuberculosis pathology in digitalized human tissue slides. The collaboration combines 40,000 digitalized TB human slides from AHRI with UAB's digital pathology expertise and access to TB autopsy tissue in a low‑incidence country. The goal is to build and validate deep learning models that can automatically detect and measure previously unrecognized pathological features in human TB tissue images, eventually expanding this analysis across the entire body. The grant will serve as a catalyst for establishing long‑term collaboration in applying AI and digital pathology to advance understanding of TB pathogenesis by uniting patient specimens from the United States and South Africa to identify new pathological patterns.
“My remarkable experiences with the AHRI TB lab and Dr. Steyn, supported by the Mary Heersink Institute for Global Health, inspired me to help our trainees gain similar career defining experiences,” said Benson. “This grant will allow Nick to pursue his interest in infectious disease pathology at one of the most cutting-edge TB labs in the world and contribute to global health innovation.”
The partnership will establish training programs in AI‑driven digital pathology, including mentorship of junior investigators and trainees. Through workshops, joint seminars, and collaborative fellowships, trainees will gain expertise in algorithm development, image curation, and quantitative tissue analytics.
"I am incredibility excited to be a pathology trainee on this team of experts in the area of TB diagnosis and pathogenesis. When I was on autopsy service as a PGY1, Dr. Paul Benson saw my passion for infectious disease pathology and over time, he became my mentor,” Eisele said. “I have fallen in love with the vast world of infectious disease pathology and am planning to pursue a fellowship in Medical Microbiology. This project will bring together cutting-edge molecular diagnostics of TB, surgical histopathology of TB lesions, and new AI learning models."