Two Department of Medicine Faculty Receive Named Professorships
Introduction
The investitures of Ece A. Mutlu, MD, MBA, MSCR, FACG, AGAF as the Thomas J. Layden, M.D. Professor in Digestive and Liver Diseases and Santosh L. Saraf, MD, as the A. Tom Petropulos M.D., FACC, Professor for Professionalism in Medicine took place on April 30, 2026 at the Sweeney Society Celebration of Excellence and Impact.
The Sweeney Society recognizes the esteemed faculty who hold named professorships or chairs at the College of Medicine and the individuals and organizations who generously support these endowed positions. The Sweeney Society is named for Raymond Nestor Sweeney, MD ’68, in honor of his significant philanthropic contribution to the College of Medicine, which has been used to establish a culture to promote faculty excellence and impact through professorships and chairs.
Ece A. Mutlu, MD, MBA, MSCR, FACG, AGAF
Dr. Ece A. Mutlu received her medical degree from Istanbul University, trained in internal medicine at Loyola University and completed her gastroenterology and hepatology fellowship at Rush University. During fellowship, she earned an MBA degree from the University of Chicago. As a junior attending, she completed her Master’s of Science in Clinical Research at Rush. After practicing there for 22 years, she joined the University of Illinois College of Medicine (UI COM) and became the Division Chief of Gastroenterology and Hepatology in 2022.
Her clinical achievements include starting the first inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) program at her former institution and growing this from a handful of patients to a sought-after program across Chicago. During this process, she received many unsolicited patient-care awards. At UI
COM, Dr. Mutlu’s leadership grew the Gastroenterology and Hepatology Division to more than twice its size in three years—making a substantial impact on overall patient visit volumes, and specifically in colon cancer screening and IBD, while also expanding the novel treatment options offered to patients with IBD, achalasia, gastroparesis, and inoperable obstructions.
Her research career began in medical school where she did work on animal studies in diabetes. During summer holidays, she worked on liposomal delivery of cancer drugs at the Lombardi Cancer Center at Georgetown. At Rush, she set up the first comprehensive biobank, and a clinical trials unit that serviced more than 100 projects. Along the process, she trained multiple clinical coordinators, nurses, and staff. This work supported several first-ofits-kind medications that have been life-altering for IBD patients, and led to the approval of the first SNS device for incontinence. Her translational research defined many of the gut microbiota changes, including the first papers on the gut microbiome in IBD, alcoholic liver disease, HIV, and the impact of air pollution on the gut mucosa, with hundreds of citations. During the process, she also learned bioinformatics and coding to analyze microbiome data, setting up an analysis server that enabled her colleagues’ papers on the gut microbiome. Her current translational research examines the interactions between diet, the gut microbiota in IBD, colon and breast cancers, focusing on archaea and steroid molecules.
Dr. Mutlu has been instrumental in starting the combined IBD/Short bowel subspecialty fellowship program, a first at UI COM and the only short bowel training program in the US. Dr. Mutlu has served as a standing member of the NIH’s training committee, led academic mentorship for junior faculty, and advised many master and PhD theses in addition to educating medical trainees, who have become funded scientists, clinicians and leaders.
Santosh L. Saraf, MD
Dr. Santosh L. Saraf is an NIH-funded physician-scientist, tenured professor, and practicing hematologist at the University of Illinois College of Medicine (UI COM). He earned his medical degree from the Temple University School of Medicine and completed his internal medicine residency and hematology/oncology fellowship at UI COM.
He joined the UI COM Division of Hematology & Oncology as faculty in 2012 and went on to complete a Master of Science in Clinical and Translational Research through the UIC School of Public Health in 2014. From 2020 to 2023, he served as Program Director for the UI COM Hematology & Oncology Fellowship. He currently directs the UIC Comprehensive Sickle Cell Center and serves as Medical Director of the UIC Clinical Research Center.
Since joining UI COM, Dr. Saraf has focused on sickle cell disease-related research, with over 140 scientific publications in high-impact journals including Blood, American Journal of Hematology, Blood Advances, Circulation, JASN, and Kidney International. He serves as Academic Editor for PLOS One and Associate Editor for the Journal of Sickle Cell Disease. His research program has been continuously supported by the NIH since shortly after completing fellowship, and he is currently Principal Investigator on three R01 awards. His NIH-funded research program has led to major contributions in understanding the genetic and molecular pathobiology of sickle cell-related kidney damage. This work has led to polygenic risk profiles that identify high-risk patients as well as in guiding the development of therapeutic targets to mitigate kidney damage in sickle cell disease. He also serves as the site PI for multiple therapeutic clinical trials, including as primary coordinating investigator for a phase 1/2 multicenter study and chair of the steering committee for a phase 3 multicenter, multinational clinical trial for sickle cell disease.
A dedicated mentor, Dr. Saraf supports early career physician-scientists through American Society of Hematology (ASH) and NIH-funded scholar programs. His commitment to mentorship has been recognized with multiple UIC Internal Medicine Residency Certificates of Excellence in Teaching, the American Society of Hematology Ambassador Award, and an NIH K24 Mid-Career Investigator Award. He has recently been invited to co-chair the American Society of Nephrology-sponsored Kidney Health Initiative on sickle cell nephropathy; to serve on the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Sickle Cell Disease Advisory Council; and to co-direct the prestigious ASH Clinical Research Training Institute.