Meet Our Director

Dr. David E. Stec, a professor in the Department of Physiology & Biophysics, and director of the Cardiovascular-Renal Research Center. He earned his PhD in physiology from the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee and received postdoctoral training in molecular genetics at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. He has served on the faculty at the University of Mississippi Medical Center since 2001.

Stec has received several awards from the American Heart Association, American Physiological Society and the International Society of Hypertension. He has served as Chair or co-Chair for peer review committees for the American Heart Association and has served as an ad hoc member of several study sections for the National Institutes of Health (NIH). He has been on the organizing committee for several meetings of the International Conference on Heme Oxygenases.

His current research focuses on the cardiovascular complications of metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD). He is also an expert in the role of heme oxygenase and its metabolite, bilirubin, in the regulation of metabolism and cardiovascular function. His lab also created the first model of knockout of the bilirubin-generating enzyme biliverdin reductase. His work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health and the American Heart Association. He has over 125 publications in leading cardiovascular and metabolic journals.