Jeff M. Sands, MD, director of the Renal Division in the Department of Medicine at Emory University School of Medicine, has been elected president-elect of the American Physiological Society (APS). Beginning in April, Sands will serve a one-year term as the society's president-elect prior to assuming the role of president in 2018. He will then serve as past-president for a one-year term in 2019.

APS is a nonprofit organization devoted to fostering education, scientific research and dissemination of information in the physiological sciences. The society has more than 10,500 members.

Sands is the Juha P. Kokko Professor of Medicine and Physiology at Emory School of Medicine. He joined the Emory faculty as an assistant professor in 1989. His research focuses on understanding the physiology of urea transport proteins, the renal inner medulla and the urine concentrating mechanism. His current research aims to define the molecular physiology of urea transporters, since urea transport is a key component in the urine concentrating mechanism. Recently, his lab has been translating their basic research findings to study whether activating AMPK with metformin, a medication that is used to treat type 2 diabetes mellitus, may be effective in treating nephrogenic diabetes insipidus.

David S. Stephens, MD, interim dean for Emory's School of Medicine says, "Dr. Sands is a national leader in physiology and medicine and Emory congratulates him on this accomplishment and the important leadership role he will assume."

Sands is a graduate of Harvard College and the Boston University School of Medicine. He trained in medicine at the University of Chicago Division of Biological Sciences at the Pritzker School of Medicine and the National Institute of Health (NIH) National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. He also completed a clinical nephrology fellowship at Emory.

While at Emory, Sands has served as the associate dean for clinical and translational research and as the executive vice chair for the Department of Medicine. He was editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Physiology – Renal Physiology from 2001 until 2007. He is a member of the American Association of Physicians, the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the American Clinical and Climatological Association. Sands has also served on the Board of Scientific Counselors of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the NIH and as chair of the Kidney Council of the American Heart Association. He is co-principal investigator of the NIH-supported Atlanta Clinical and Translational Science Institute (ACTSI).

Sands attends on the renal service at Emory University Hospital.