![[Pictured here with Chef David Sullivan, Juanita Merchant, MD, PhD, talks to attendees at Docs in the Kitchen culinary demonstration for healthy eating at the Hacienda at the River retirement community in June 2023.]](https://deptmedicine.arizona.edu/sites/default/files/styles/medium_image/public/docs_in_kitchen_2023-06-10_img_8365-4895_900x600_0.jpg?itok=wEARCrDz "Pictured here with Chef David Sullivan, Juanita Merchant, MD, PhD, talks to attendees at Docs in the Kitchen culinary demonstration for healthy eating at the Hacienda at the River retirement community in June 2023.")
Congratulations to Juanita L. Merchant, MD, PhD, who was singled out for recognition by the University of Arizona Office of Research, Innovation and Impact as one of 30 faculty and staff who have each contributed significantly to the university’s identity as a world-class research enterprise.
The Women of Impact awardees are carefully selected based on their commitment to UArizona’s purpose, mission and values, unique skills in driving discovery and innovation, community impact, and willingness to empower others. Their contributions build the groundwork for a brighter future.
Dr. Merchant, Regents Professor and chief of the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology in the Department of Medicine, associate director for basic sciences and Cancer Biology Program research member at the UArizona Cancer Center, is among three women from the College of Medicine – Tucson to receive the honor this year.
![[Photo of a black woman with gray hair wearing a blue-and-white striped sleeveless blouse.]](https://deptmedicine.arizona.edu/sites/default/files/styles/very_small_image/public/merchant-juanita-md-phd_gastro-33_201800087_4x6.jpg?itok=0VDSmMhI "Juanita L. Merchant, MD, PhD")
The others are: Anne Cress, PhD, a professor of cellular and molecular medicine and radiation oncology as well as vice dean for operations and strategy, and Felicia Goodrum, PhD, interim associate head of the Department of Immunobiology. All three also are BIO5 Institute members.
"I'm extremely humbled and honored to be selected as one of three recipients from the College of Medicine. As a physician-scientist, I am pleased to continue to raise the profile of women in the biomedical sciences," Dr. Merchant said.
Awardees will be recognized at a private event Oct. 20. You can see all 30 of this year’s Women of Impact cohort at the RII website here: https://research.arizona.edu/women.
This is the second year for the awards. Included among the inaugural 30 Women of Impact honorees for the Class of 2022 from the Department of Medicine were two associate professors in the Division of Hematology & Oncology: Jennifer Carew, PhD, and Lalitha Madhavan, MD, PhD. Madhavan’s primary appointment is in the Division of Neurology.
Merchant has had a big impact on the department, the Cancer Center and the college since her arrival here in 2018 from the University of Michigan where she had been on faculty since 1991. She already was an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and the Board of Scientific Counselors for the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, a unit of the National Institutes of Health.
She grew up in Los Angeles and attended Stanford University for undergraduate studies, later earning her medical degree and a doctorate at the Yale University School of Medicine. Afterward, she did her internal medicine residency training as well as a clinical and research fellowship at Harvard Medical School’s Massachusetts General Hospital, before doing a gastroenterology fellowship at UCLA.
Over three decades, Merchant has compiled a valuable portfolio of research on the molecular biology of gastric cancers and the regulation of colon cancer by a transcription factor she isolated named ZBP-89 that zeroes in on it and gastrin’s role in gastric cancer initiated by H. pylori infection.
In a recent profile for the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, she recalled being directed by high school counselors to take home economics, where she learned to sew, cook, knit and type, and filled her summers with college prep courses that set her on a path to medicine. The love of cooking led her back to the topic with creation of the Cookin’ Docs program that more recently has resulted in Docs in the Kitchen culinary demonstrations for healthy eating. The next event is Saturday, Sept. 30, 4-6 p.m., at Hacienda at the River.