UI faculty member awarded prestigious lectureship for early career researchers

Anna Stanhewicz, University of Iowa associate professor in the Department of Health, Sport, and Human Physiology, has been awarded the prestigious 2026 Henry Pickering Bowditch Award, a national award for excellence as an early career scholar from the American Physiological Society.

The award is given to an American Physiological Society member who is 42 or younger and eight years from the start of their first faculty or staff research scientist position beyond postdoctoral training, in recognition of their outstanding accomplishments in the field of physiology.

As part of the award, Stanhewicz will deliver a lecture at the American Physiology Summit in April 2026.

"I am incredibly honored to be receiving this award," Stanhewicz says. "The work that I do means a lot to me personally, but it also reflects the mentoring I have received and the dedication and hard work of my lab staff and trainees who help me turn my scientific ideas into meaningful data. I am honored that the American Physiological Society has given me the opportunity to highlight this work."

Stanhewicz is an emerging leader in women's cardiovascular physiology. Her work has strengthened understanding of how complications in the body's small blood vessels contribute to heart and metabolic diseases, especially in women at higher risk. She has uncovered important connections between pregnancy complications - such as preeclampsia and gestational diabetes - and long-term blood vessel issues, helping pave the way for new prevention and treatment strategies.

"My research agenda is really focused on understanding subtle changes in physiology that precede chronic diseases such as heart disease or diabetes, with the long-term goal of identifying opportunities to prevent disease progression," Stanhewicz says. "It is known that women who experience adverse outcomes in pregnancy are more likely to develop chronic disease later in life, but why this is the case is not well understood. This is a relatively understudied area, so I am motivated to fill this gap in understanding with the hope that we can contribute to longer, healthier lives for these women."

Stanhewicz earned a Bachelor of Science in Kinesiology at the University of Rhode Island and a Master of Science in Physiology and PhD in Kinesiology from Pennsylvania State University. She joined the faculty at Iowa in 2019.