Alan Saltiel

Professor Alan Saltiel first moved to the University of California, San Diego to create the Institute for Diabetes and Metabolic Health in 2015, where he now directs that Institute, as well as the UCSD/UCLA Diabetes Research Center, and serves as Professor of Medicine and Pharmacology.

Previously, Dr. Saltiel was the founding Director of the Life Sciences Institute of the University of Michigan, and John Jacob Abel Professor in the Life Sciences. Under Dr. Saltiel’s leadership, the Institute became home to 30 faculty and over 400 scientists in all areas of life sciences. Dr. Saltiel also served as the Distinguished Research Fellow and Senior Director/Vice President of Cell Biology at Parke Davis Pharmaceutical Research (now Pfizer), and directed drug discovery activities in diabetes, obesity and cancer. He was responsible for preclinical studies on troglitazone, the first thiazolidinedione approved for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. He also developed the first MEK inhibitors for the treatment of cancer-the first received FDA approval for melanoma and other cancers. Dr. Saltiel has received numerous awards, including the Rosalyn Yalow Research and Development Award from the American Diabetes Association, the Hirschl Award, the John Jacob Abel and the Goodman and Gilman Awards from ASPET, was elected as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and elected to membership in the American Society of Clinical Investigation and to the National Academy of Medicine. He has made important contributions to our understanding of the cellular actions of the hormone insulin, and the inflammatory links between obesity and type 2 diabetes, including the development of new drugs and drug targets. He has nineteen issued patents and published over 300 original papers with over 58,000 citations and H-Index of 108. Professor Saltiel received his AB in Zoology from Duke University and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of North Carolina.