The UCLA Olympic Analytical Laboratory (OAL) is one of the world’s largest World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) accredited sports drug-testing facilities. As one of the leading institutions in the field of athletic antidoping, OAL is one of two laboratories in the U.S. accredited by WADA. The laboratory analyzes an estimated 40,000 urine specimens per year for traces of banned substances intended to give athletes an unfair edge in competition. The lab performs drug testing for national and international sports organizations, including the National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA), National Football League (NFL), Major League Baseball (MLB), the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) and has provided testing services for major sporting events such as the 1994 World Soccer Cup and three Olympic Games.

UCLA OAL has been a leader in research activities directed towards enhancing methods to detect doping in sports. UCLA OAL has contributed to the findings of techniques and substances that currently influence the fight against doping in sports:

• In 1990 UCLA OAL and others conducted research that resulted in the development of a gas chromatography-combustion-isotope ratio mass spectrometry (IRMS) method to detect exogenous testosterone administration. Adaptations of this technique are currently utilized to detect a variety of steroids in urine specimens.
• In 2000 the laboratory identified trace-contamination of an over-the-counter supplement with an anabolic steroid and demonstrated the amount present could result in positive urine test results.
• In 2002 the laboratory identified norbolethone, a steroid that had never been marketed, in an athlete’s urine.
• In 2004 the laboratory published its findings regarding the isolation of tetrahydrogestrinone (THG), a steroid previously unknown in literature.
• In 2009 the laboratory became one of the first among WADA-laboratories to transition to high-throughput testing utilizing 96-well plate format demonstrating that such an approach remained both robust and highly-sensitive.
• In 2018 the laboratory published findings on low-dose ethanol administration effect on the urinary testosterone to epitestosterone ratio by GC-MS/MS as well as urine reference intervals for human chorionic gonadotrophin utilizing a LC-MS/MS based approach.
• In 2019 the laboratory published it findings on the urinary concentration of the AMPK-activator AICAR in an athlete population as well as the utility of isotopically labeled boldenone as a quality control marker for efficiency of chemical derivative formation.
• In 2021 the laboratory published methodology allowing assessment of urinary cobalt by LC-MS/MS technology available in house to all WADA-accredited laboratories where previously such analysis required ICP-MS.
• In 2023 the laboratory published its findings concerning first time detection of the unapproved selective androgen receptor modulator YK-11 in an athlete’s urine.

Back row (left to right): Elise Parsaee, Yan Xu, Ronald Gonzalez, Brian Ahrens, Francis Regacho, Samantha Adams, Mustafa Cittan, Nurali Avliyakulov, Brian Bishop, Timofei Sobolevskii

Front row (left to right): Shirley Taam, Monika Abeywardena, Yulia Kucherova, Fereshteh Delshad, Dr. Dry, Roya Kashanpour, Christina Zaragoza, Tatiana Sergeeva, Lorna Reyes, Maria Gomez

 

In collaboration the UCLA Vatche & Tamar Manoukian Division of Digestive Diseases, UCLA Pathology participated in UCLA Health's 2024 Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month Kick-Off Event with an Interactive Pathology Station! The event included an educational station with genetic counselors to discuss hereditary CRC, giveaways, and back by popular demand, the inflatable colon!

 

Thank you to all who made this possible:

Above: The Pathology Interactive Station at the CRC event

Below: Dr. Ana Munteanu & Dr. Irene Riahi interacting with individuals at the event

Left: Dr. Ana Munteanu, Dr. Kene Ojukwu, Dr. Bita Naini, Dr. David Dawson, Dr. Sam French, Dr. Daniel Stefanko, Dr. Hanlin Wang, Dr. Alison Du, Dr. Sarah Zhang, & Dr. Jeff Goldstein

 

Right: Students viewing various colon slides at our Interactive Pathology Station

Left: Dr. Kene Ojukwu and Dr. Ana Munteanu
Right: Dr. Irene Riahi, Dr. Daniel Stefanko, Dr. Jeff Goldstein, Dr. Alison Du, and Dr. Sarah Zhang

Left to Right: Dr. Anamaria Munteanu, Dr. Kene Ojukwu, Dr. Bita Naini, Dr. David Dawson, Dr. Hanlin Wang, Dr. Sam French, Dr. Daniel Stefanko, Dr. Alison Du, and Dr. Sarah Zhang

The 3rd Annual Black History Month Blood Drive took place on Saturday, February 3, 2024. The event was hosted by our Blood & Platelet Center along with multiple African American groups coming together in support of blood donation. Donations are essential to stabilize our inventory during the recent national blood shortage and can save lives.   Please consider your life-saving donation today!

EDI Committee Co-Chair - Dr. Erica Fermon & Dr. Danny Rodriguez

We are pleased to announce Dr. Erica Fermon, rising PGY-3, will transition into the role of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Co-Chair as the Trainee representative as of March 1, 2024. Dr. Fermon assumes the position from Dr. Danny Rodriguez, Dermatopathology Fellow.

Dr. Fermon obtained her medical degree from Meharry Medical College, the nation’s largest private, historically black academic health science center. She has a passion for academic excellence, mentoring, and diversifying the workforce in hopes to further inclusion within the clinical learning environment and healthcare as a whole. She currently serves as a committee member of the UCLA Minority Housestaff Organization, dedicating her time to supporting and developing programs and initiatives that develop and advance physicians from historically under-represented racial and ethnic groups in medicine. She looks forward to continuing to further the adoption of equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives here at UCLA and in this community while serving in this role.

Dr. Rodriguez, as a founding member of the Department EDI Committee, has served as the Trainee representative since 2021, during both his residency and fellowship. During his time on the committee, Dr. Rodriguez has been instrumental in key initiatives such as recruitment diversity at the staff, trainee, and faculty levels, creating a pipeline program in conjunction with the DGSOM, increased diversity of speakers for department education and seminars, and journal/book club discussions.

We would like to thank Dr. Rodriguez for all his hard work, dedication, and commitment to the EDI Committee and Department. We are grateful that he will help Dr. Fermon transition into her new role.

Please join us in welcoming Dr. Fermon to this role!

Translational Research Fund (TRF) Award Recipients

The purpose of the Translational Research Fund (TRF) is to help prepare and support Anatomic Pathology and Clinical Pathology UCLA Faculty – initiated research with particular focus on translational projects and to foster greater involvement by UCLA pathology residents and fellows in research projects. We would like to recognize and congratulate to our 2023-2024 Translational Research Award Recipients!

Dr. Alison Du - Fibrosis progression in patients with chronic hepatic venous outflow obstruction (CHVOO)

Dr. Fumin Lin - Characterizing 21q amplification as the sole chromosomal aberration in a de novo AML patient

Dr. Nicole Valenzuela - Mapping the compartmentalized and contextual expression of HLA during heart transplant rejection

Dr. Kene Ojukwu, along with Dr. Michelle Hickey & Monique Trinh - Optimizing Interdisciplinary Communication to Improve Patient Care - An Interactive Curriculum to Enhance the Dialogue between Pathology and Surgery

Dr. Shaun Yang & Collette Match - Microbial identification and clinical characterization of invasive infections using a novel automated NGS library preparation system and 16S/ITS amplicon sequencing of plasma and body fluid

Dr. Shaun Yang & Dr. Ran Zhuo - Development of a rapid pan-Nocardia real-time PCR for the diagnosis of pulmonary nocardiosis

Dr. Tom Lee - Project focused on use of artificial intelligence (AI) to improve hematologic malignancy ordering workflow in molecular testing

Dr. Jennifer Zhang - Enhanced mixed donor chimerism analysis and clinical applications in allo-HCT

Dr. Israa Laklouk & Dr. Dipti Sajed - Clinicopathologic and Molecular Characteristics Across the Spectrum of Myoepithelial-Rich Pleomorphic Adenomas to Myoepithelial Carcinoma-ex Pleomorphic Adenomas

Dr. Ka Hang Brian Lam, Chemistry Fellow, and team hosted a Clinical Laboratory Scientist information session on January 29 as part of the UCLA undergraduate course Careers in Chemistry & Biochemistry (CHEM147). These sessions allowed the opportunity for those interested in the CLS career path to learn more about the role, ask questions, and interact with current CLS team members. The session was a great success with 118 attendees signed up to attend both virtually and in person! Thank you to our panelists, Dr. Lam, Nathan Okawa, and Joo Lee Sohn, for sharing their experience and answering questions for the students and special thank you to Dr. Lam for contacting the course coordinator to offer this session jointly for the course-going and non-course-going students at UCLA. 

 

Thank you Dr. Lam, Monique Trinh, Andrew Tum, Eunice Lee, Joo Hee Sohn, and Nathan Okawa for your assistance with this event!

From left to right: Andrew Tum, Eunice Lee, Joo Hee Sohn, Nathan Okawa, Dr. Ka Hang Brian Lam, and Dr. Sarah Dry

Thank You, Pathology Facilities!

I wanted to thank our Pathology Facilities team for all their hard work to help our staff, trainees and faculty whose spaces were affected by the recent rains.

The team has created a comprehensive Excel spreadsheet (with embedded photos) documenting all rooms with damage and the exact damage. This comprehensive list will greatly help us in ongoing discussions with DGSOM and campus aimed at identifying more permanent solutions.

The team also rapidly filed tickets/alerted campus facilities teams to all issues/damage requiring work by teams outside of Pathology, worked to minimize ongoing water intrusion, brought in fans/dehumidifiers and cleaned up other damage (fallen floor tiles, etc.) as quickly as possible.

Unfortunately, many areas across our Department were affected, and thus Pathology Facilities has been very busy the past few weeks.

Even though our Pathology Facilities team worked hard to dry out the affected areas, it is possible that mold or mildew could develop in the future. Please be alert for this and notify Pathology Facilities ASAP if you notice anything.

If you see a member of our Pathology Facilities team, please thank them for all their efforts and help!

Back row (from left to right): Chris Pang-Gonzalez, Joe Church, and Amari Moore

Front row (from left to right): Teresa Mejia, Lindy Weber, and Jessica Martinez (not pictured: Carla Linares)

Dr. Dinesh Rao has been appointed the Chair of the American Society of Hematology’s Scientific Committee on Epigenetics and Genomics for 2024. Dr. Rao and the committee are tasked with organizing the scientific symposium of ASH, which is the world’s largest meeting of hematologists, with the most recent meeting having an attendance of >31,000 individuals from 113 countries.

Dr. Dinesh Rao and his lab have published two journal articles in 2024 thus far. In the first manuscript,  Rao’s group demonstrated that the effect of a new drug that is being used to treat certain subtypes of leukemia can be enhanced by knocking out an oncogenic RNA binding protein. Read more here.

In the second manuscript, Dr. Rao’s group reviews the literature for small molecule inhibitors of RNA binding proteins, which represent potential drug candidates. This is a new area of research, since these proteins were traditionally thought to be “undruggable”.  Read more here.

In a collaborative effort with Dr. Ajit Divakaruni, Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology, Dr. Dinesh Rao was awarded a Jonsson Comprehensive Center Seed Grant to study the effects of metabolism on gene expression as it relates to RNA binding proteins. This collaborative effort will bring together the expertise of these two faculty members and their labs to define a new area of biology with relevance to leukemia and cancer.

In the latest edition of White Coats, the Association for the Advancement of Blood & Biotherapies (AABB) spoke with Dr. Dawn Ward about her career, the power of mentorship and her efforts to increase the diversity of the blood supply.