Anna Stanhewicz, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of HHP and the Director of the Microvascular Physiology Lab. The Microvascular Physiology Lab studies human cutaneous circulation, in an effort to understand how blood vessels function in health and disease. Dr. Stanhewicz’s research program investigates which mechanisms control blood vessel function, how those mechanisms change in people who have cardiovascular or metabolic diseases, and what strategies can be employed to prevent or reverse these diseases. The current focus of the Microvascular Physiology Lab is on the factors that contribute to vascular dysfunction in women who’ve had preeclampsia during pregnancy. Preeclampsia is a hypertensive disorder of pregnancy that resolves after delivery. Despite the remission of preeclampsia symptoms after giving birth, women with a history of this disorder are four times more likely to develop cardiovascular disease later in life. Dr. Stanhewicz and her team are working to understand the changes in cellular mechanisms during preeclamptic pregnancies, and to identify physiological and pharmacological interventions to treat those changes.

Dr. Stanhewicz was raised in New York, and she earned her Bachelor of Science in Kinesiology from the University of Rhode Island. She earned both her Master of Science and Doctoral degrees from Penn State University, and she completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Penn State before joining the Department of Health and Human Physiology in August of 2019. Dr. Stanhewicz is currently funded by the National Institutes of Health and the UI Fraternal Order of Eagles Diabetes Research Center.

For more information, visit the Microvascular Physiology Lab website.