Deborah Stearns-Kurosawa to Step Down as GMS Associate Provost/Dean ad interim

Deborah Stearns-Kurosawa, PhD, has announced plans to step down from her role as Associate Provost/Dean ad interim for Graduate Medical Sciences (GMS) effective Dec. 31, 2021, or whenever her successor is selected. She will remain on the faculty as an associate professor of pathology & laboratory medicine thru June 30, 2022, at which point she will retire from Boston University to spend time with family and gardening.

Dr. Stearns-Kurosawa earned a BS in biochemistry from Pennsylvania State University, and a PhD in chemistry from Cleveland State University with graduate research at the Cleveland Clinic. She then completed post-doctoral training in a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) laboratory at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation focused on mechanisms of blood coagulation.

She joined BU in 2008 as an assistant professor of pathology & laboratory medicine. At BU, her research focuses on host contributions to distinct coagulation abnormalities from bacterial and E.coli toxin-induced severe sepsis. She was continuously funded as principal or co-investigator on numerous NIH and organizational grants for two decades and holds multiple patents. Dr. Stearns-Kurosawa also served on the editorial board of Shock journal for seven years and has consulted for five pharmaceutical companies.

She was a core faculty member of the BU Faculty Innovation Network that supported development of the Innovate@BU initiative for student entrepreneurs, and designed the GMS PA810 Seminars in the Business of Science course to lead students through the business realities of modern biomedical sciences. She directed and teaches medical immunology for medical and graduate students, and co-directs the general pathology course in the dental school. She has mentored more than a dozen Master’s, PhD and post-doctoral fellows through their research training and into successful careers.

Dr. Stearns-Kurosawa has served on numerous School of Medicine and GMS committees, and chaired the Institutional Biosafety Committee. She guided the GMS graduate programs through the transitions forced by the pandemic and the successful return to campus. She also restructured GMS to include a new business office, expanded the registrar’s office, and re-aligned admissions, marketing and student services personnel to better serve the GMS community.