Dr. Kurt R. Zinn, DVM, MS, PhD, presented to the MSU Board of Trustees to provide an overview of the research being conducted in his lab, how his team is leveraging the assets of the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams, and the connections he is making to MSU's health care partners across the state. His research includes the development of molecular imaging approaches for cancer diagnosis, treatment monitoring, and therapy. Zinn has contributed significantly to more than 10 phase I clinical trials.

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Zinn was recruited to MSU's Institute of Quantitative Health Science and Engineering (IQ) in August of 2017 under the Global Impact Initiative. He is a professor of Radiology, Biomedical Engineering, and Small Animal Clinical Sciences, with appointments in the Colleges of Engineering, Human Medicine, and Veterinary Medicine.

Zinn completed his undergraduate studies in Chemistry (BA) at the University of Missouri-Columbia (UMC), followed by veterinary medicine (DVM) and graduate education at UMC where he earned MS (Chemistry) and PhD (Biochemistry) degrees.

He joined the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Radiology faculty in 1995 after 9 years as a scientist at the UMC Research Reactor, the highest-flux research reactor in the US. As a professor of Radiology at UAB from 2003-2017, he also served as director of Radiology’s Division of Advanced Medical Imaging Research from 2009-2017 and vice-chair of Translational Research from 2015-2017. A Distinguished Investigator Award was presented to Zinn in 2015 by the Academy of Radiology Research.