Andrew Terker, MD, PhD, is a physician scientist committed to advancing the understanding and treatment of kidney disease, and received a 2022 National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director’s Early Independence Award.
The award provides $250,000 in direct research costs annually for up to five years. It is part of the NIH Common Fund’s High-Risk, High-Reward Research Program, which supports “exceptionally creative scientists pursuing highly innovative research with the potential for broad impact.”
Dr. Terker attended Swarthmore College where he majored in mathematics and statistics. After college, he worked in a lab studying HIV before moving to Portland, Oregon to enter the MD/PhD program at Oregon Health & Science University. At OHSU, he fell in love with renal physiology while completing his dissertation on how the distal nephron determines potassium balance and blood pressure.