Gene Siegal, M.D., Ph.D., the inaugural Robert W. Mowry Endowed Professor and Executive Vice Chair, retired on December 31, 2024, after 34 years of service in the UAB Department of Pathology.
Siegal earned his medical degree in 1974 from the University of Louisville School of Medicine in Kentucky. While a pathology resident at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, he pursued a Ph.D. in experimental pathology from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, awarded in 1979, and followed by a postdoctoral fellowship in Biochemistry at the National Cancer Institute. Siegal undertook a fellowship in surgical pathology at the University of Minnesota Medical School’s Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology under the direction of renowned pathologist, Dr. Juan Rosai.
In 1982, Siegal joined the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine as an assistant professor. He was promoted to associate professor and tenured in 1988. While there, he earned a certificate in hospital management from the Kenan-Flagler School of Business Administration in Chapel Hill. In 1990, he was recruited to UAB as division director of Anatomic Pathology and professor in the UAB Department of Pathology, a position he held for a quarter of a century. Siegal simultaneously served as a senior scientist in the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center and as a professor in both the Departments of Cell, Developmental, and Integrative Biology and Surgery since 1991. In 1995, he began serving as a senior scientist in the Comprehensive Center for Healthy Aging.
Siegal served as both a senior scientist and founding member of the Cell Adhesion and Matrix Research Center, the Center for Metabolic Bone Disease, the Gene Therapy Center, the BioMatrix Engineering and Regenerative Medicine Center and the Comprehensive Arthritis, Musculoskeletal, Bone and Autoimmunity Center. In addition to these roles, he served as senior scientist in the Nephrology Research and Training Center and the Center for Biophysical Sciences and Engineering.
In 2008, Siegal was named the inaugural Robert W. Mowry Endowed Professor of Pathology and the Executive Vice Chair for the Department of Pathology. Siegal has served as interim chair of the department twice over the course of his career at UAB and more than 3 years as interim chair of the UAB Department of Genetics. He has been an attending pathologist at UAB and its affiliate hospitals for his entire career and has held UAB’s CLIA license as its medical director of hospital laboratories. The UAB Board of Trustees honored Siegal by naming him a Distinguished Professor in 2021, the only pathologist at UAB having received this honor.
Siegal’s primary research focus is the gene therapy of solid tumors and experimental tumor invasion and metastasis. His clinical focus is neoplasms of bone and related conditions. Over the course of his career, Siegal authored nearly 400 manuscripts, 400 abstracts, 11 books and 41 book chapters. He has served on nearly 30 editorial boards and has held editorships for several journals in his field, including serving as senior associate editor of the American Journal of Pathology and editor-in-chief of Laboratory Investigation. Siegal holds a patent for Biologically Activated Native Biomatrix Composition.
Siegal has garnered millions of dollars in research grants over his decades-long research career and earned a multitude of academic honors. This includes the ASIP Robbins Distinguished Educator Award, the CAP Lifetime Achievement Award and the ASCP Philip Levine Award for Outstanding Research. He has delivered nearly 200 invited lectures and symposia, several of which include named lectures. He is an elected fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine in London, Phi Beta Delta, Honor Society for International Scholars and is an inaugural fellow of Sigma Xi. However, if you ask him what his most important achievement has been, he will say it's the large number of truly outstanding mentees he's been privileged to work with, including several who remain on faculty, who have gone on to distinguish themselves in their professional pursuits.
“Educating future generations of pathologists has been Dr. Siegal’s passion,” said Shi Wei, M.D., Ph.D., Division Director, Women’s Health, and former trainee of Siegal’s. “He is an outstanding mentor, and his knowledge of pathology is encyclopedic. I greatly cherish our professional relationships over the last two decades, from being a trainee to a colleague.”
“Gene is an esteemed colleague and an extraordinary pathologist,” said Cristina Magi-Galluzzi, M.D., Ph.D., Robert and Ruth Anderson Endowed Chair in Pathology. “He has been a valuable member of the UAB Department of Pathology for 34 years, during which time he served as a dedicated diagnostician, an effective leader and an inspirational mentor to many. We wish him all the best in his retirement.”
Going forward, Siegal plans to revise one of his many books, spend more time with his deeply cherished wife of 52 years and clean up his office.
“Dr. Siegal has always led by example, inspiring those around him with his dedication, integrity and kindness,” Wei said. “As he steps into this exciting new chapter of his life, I want to express my deepest gratitude for all the guidance, wisdom and support he has shared over the year. He has shaped not only my career, but also my perspective on growth and leadership. His legacy will continue to resonate with all of us he has guided.”