ARLINGTON, Virginia, July 7 -- Associated Builders and Contractors issued the following news release: Associated Builders and Contractors announced the cancellation of ABC Convention 2020, which was scheduled for Aug. 17-19 in Nashville, Tennessee. The event, which includes the National Craft Championships, Construction Management Competition and National Excellence in Construction(R) Awards, was previously postponed from March due to the coronavirus pandemic. "While it was disappointing to c  more

WASHINGTON, July 8 -- The Council on American-Islamic Relations issued the following news release: The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation's largest American Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, responded to racist incidents in Indiana, Tennessee, Virginia, and Vermont, saying such expressions of racism and white supremacy are "unfortunately a daily occurrence." A Bloomington, Ind., Black man says he was assaulted and almost lynched by a group of white people on   more

ARLINGTON, Virginia, July 11 -- The Institute for Justice issued the following news release on July 9: The Nashville Metropolitan Council voted early Wednesday morning to repeal the city's longstanding ban on home businesses that serve customers. Barring an unlikely veto by Nashville's mayor, Nashville home businesses will soon be allowed six customer visits a day, six days a week. The Institute for Justice and the Beacon Center of Tennessee have been litigating to end Nashville's client ban si  more

MURFREESBORO, Tennessee, July 9 -- The Tennessee Electric Cooperative Association issued the following news: Having just completed its merger with the Murfreesboro Electric Department, Middle Tennessee Electric (MTE) announced $100,000 in donations to three Murfreesboro-based charitable organizations. Rutherford County Area Habitat for Humanity will receive $50,000 while Wee Care Day Care and Community Helpers will receive $25,000 each. "We think it's fitting and appropriate to mark our first   more

NEW YORK, July 7 -- The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund issued the following news release: The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) sent a letter to Tennessee Governor Bill Lee over concerns that the Business Relief Program, meant to distribute funds the state received from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act to small businesses facing financial hardship caused by the pandemic, will adversely impact Black-owned businesses most in need of assis  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- The National Health Care for Homeless Council issued the following news release: On July 15, 2020, the National Health Care for the Homeless Council will launch the National Institute for Medical Respite Care (NIMRC), the first-of-its-kind institute to identify best practices, offer expert services, and advance state-of-the-field knowledge in medical respite care (also known as medical recuperative care). With the growing number of COVID-19 cases in the United   more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws issued the following news release: The Office of the District Attorney for Davidson County (population: 694,000), which includes the city of Nashville, has announced that it will immediately cease prosecuting low-level marijuana possession offenses. In a statement issued last week by District Attorney Glenn Funk, he said that activities involving the possession of up to one-half ounce of cannabis will n  more

MEMPHIS, Tennessee, July 9 -- St. Jude Children's Research Hospital issued the following news release: Pat Keel, who since 2016 has served as chief financial officer at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, has been promoted to the expanded role of executive vice president and chief administrative and financial officer. In the new role, she oversees numerous departments vital to campus operations, including Environmental Services, Facilities Design and Construction, Facilities Operations and   more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 9 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following transcript on July 8 by President and CEO Jeff Balser: At VUMC we believe in caring for every person, regardless of their skin color, their resources, their gender, or their story. In fact, one of the four strategic directions guiding all decisions we make is to "Make Diversity and Inclusion Intentional." Yet we know there are still barriers within the Medical Center to making that vision a reality -- some  more

MEMPHIS, Tennessee, July 7 -- St. Jude Children's Research Hospital issued the following news release on July 6: Gene coding regions constitute 2% of the human genome. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital scientists have developed a computational tool to identify alterations that drive tumor formation in the remaining 98% of the genome. The method will aid discovery of oncogenes and advances in precision medicine for children and adults with cancer. The approach, detailed today in the journal  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 8 -- The Tennessee Bar Association issued the following news: The TBA Board of Governors has selected Hamilton County General Sessions Judge Alexander McVeagh to fill the vacant position of Young Lawyer Delegate to the American Bar Association House of Delegates. McVeagh will fill the post vacated by Troy Weston, who resigned to move out of state. McVeagh also serves as East Tennessee governor on the TBA YLD Board, and is also president-elect of the Chattanooga Ba  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- The Tennessee Electric Cooperative Association issued the following news: Tennessee's electric cooperatives recently awarded $16,000 in scholarships to young people from across the state. Kelsey Bizzell, a recent graduate of Rossville Christian Academy, was awarded a $10,000 Cooperative Youth Ambassador Scholarship. Bizzell was a 2019 delegate of the Washington Youth Tour, an annual leadership and education event sponsored by the state's electric cooperatives.   more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 11 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: For the world's web users, Vanderbilt University Medical Center is working with Google to address COVID-19 information gaps. The folks at Google keep track of any web searches made through google.com that appear to go unanswered by the web. Last year, through a program called Question Hub, the company began collaborating with web publishers in Asia and Africa to post answers to questions that the w  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: Mariana Byndloss, DVM, PhD, assistant professor of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology, has been selected as a finalist of the inaugural NOSTER & Science Microbiome Prize. The prize was established to recognize innovative research by young investigators "working on the functional attributes of the microbiota" -- the microorganisms that live in or on a host. It is sponsored by NOSTER, a new brand  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 9 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: The IVY Research Network has completed initial studies evaluating the epidemiology of COVID-19 in health care workers and patients. Among 249 front-line health care workers who cared for COVID-19 patients during the first month of the pandemic in Tennessee, 8% tested positive for COVID-19 antibodies by serology testing, suggesting they had contracted COVID-19 in the first several weeks of taking car  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: Autonomic disorders such as orthostatic hypotension are often debilitating neurological and neurodegenerative conditions that disrupt vital autonomic (involuntary) functions including blood pressure and heart rate. A new Clinical Fellowship in Autonomic Disorders began this month at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Administered through the Division of Clinical Pharmacology in the Department of  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news on July 9: On March 27, Nashville resident Bill Boyce, 73, earned the unwelcome distinction of becoming the first patient intubated on Vanderbilt University Medical Center's dedicated COVID-19 unit. He spent 28 days under the vigilant care of the inpatient COVID-19 team, ultimately recovering to be discharged to home on April 24. He credits a broad network of care at VUMC, a continuum of watchfulnes  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: The proteins Sin3a and Sin3b act as scaffolds for protein complexes that regulate gene expression to control cell differentiation, survival and function. Guoqiang Gu, PhD, and colleagues have assessed the roles of Sin3a/b in the embryonic development and postnatal function of pancreatic insulin-secreting beta cells. They discovered that mice missing Sin3a in endocrine progenitor cells (cells that   more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: Sunil Kripalani, MD, MSc, professor of Medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, has been appointed director of the Vanderbilt Center for Health Services Research. The center, a critical component of the Institute for Medicine and Public Health (IMPH), engages with more than 160 scientists and other professionals across VUMC to conduct research and discover, implement and disseminate workab  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 9 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: Scientists at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen) in Phoenix, Arizona, have discovered previously unreported genetic and cellular changes that occur in the lungs of people with pulmonary fibrosis (PF). Their findings, reported Wednesday, July 8, in the journal Science Advances, should aid the search for new ways to treat or prevent this devas  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 7 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: Martin Montenovo, MD, a liver transplant surgeon, has joined Vanderbilt University Medical Center as associate professor of Surgery in the Division of Hepatobiliary Surgery & Liver Transplantation. He began seeing patients on September 1, 2019. "Dr. Montenovo is a caring and highly capable transplant surgeon and we are fortunate to have been able to recruit him to VUMC," said Carmen Solorzano, MD, J  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: The Vanderbilt Institute for Infection, Immunology and Inflammation (VI4) recently moved into its new research and administrative home. The state-of-the-art facilities in Medical Center North represent the first phase of research space for VI4, which was created in 2017 as a key initiative of the VUMC Strategic Directions. VI4 provides a trans-institutional framework for building and supporting the  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: The news about remdesivir, the investigational anti-viral drug that has shown early promise in the fight against COVID-19, keeps getting better. This week researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC), the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Gilead Sciences reported (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211124720309219) that remdesivir potently inhibited SARS  more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news on July 9: Brenda and Colin Reed, chair and CEO of Ryman Hospitality Properties, are thankful they get to watch their two curious, blue-eyed, 3-year-old twin granddaughters, Olivia and Alice Reed, grow up. The Reed family recently made a transformative philanthropic gift to Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt to support a fetal clinic space and help other families and newborns, like   more

NASHVILLE, Tennessee, July 10 -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center issued the following news: Research to Prevent Blindness (RPB) recently awarded a grant to investigators in Vanderbilt's Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences to support research into the causes, treatment and prevention of blinding diseases. The department received an RPB Unrestricted Grant, which provides $115,000 per year to support research activities within the department. It will be allocated by Paul Sternber  more