Top Researchers
Top Medicine Researchers at University of Southern California for 2026
Research at the University of Southern California spans a wide range of Medicine, with recent work reaching from clinical care and surgical outcomes to population health, imaging, and mental health. Looking across the last year, a clear picture emerges of an institution where researchers are studying both individual diseases and the systems that shape diagnosis, treatment, and recovery.
Below, you’ll see a snapshot of USC scholars whose recent publications reflect that breadth. Their work highlights active conversations in specialties such as surgery, psychiatry and mental health, epidemiology, and obstetrics and gynecology, alongside other closely connected areas in modern medicine.
Featured Researchers
Koji Matsuo
Koji Matsuo’s recent USC publications center on obstetrics and gynecology, reproductive medicine, and epidemiology, with studies on placenta accreta spectrum disorder, cervical cancer, and sentinel lymph node biopsy.
Activity over the last year: 46 indexed journal articles.
Top publications:
- Nationwide Assessment of Gestational Age Distribution at Delivery for Patients With Placenta Accreta Spectrum Disorder (Feb 2025)
- Clinical and pathological characteristics and outcomes of small cell neuroendocrine carcinoma of the uterine cervix (Jul 2025)
- Temporal trends of sentinel lymph node biopsy without lymphadenectomy at cervical cancer surgery (Apr 2025)
Jeffrey D. Klausner
Jeffrey D. Klausner’s recent work at USC spans microbiology, physiology, and infectious diseases, including sexually transmitted infections, hepatitis C linkage to cure, and the spatial epidemiology of infection.
Activity over the last year: 44 indexed journal articles.
Top publications:
- Prevalence, symptomology, and correlates of curable sexually transmitted infections among pregnant women in Eastern Cape, South Africa (Jun 2025)
- Project HCV Connect: Using a County Surveillance Registry to Link Hepatitis C Virus-Infected Residents to Cure—Los Angeles County, April 2023 to March 2024 (Mar 2025)
- Insights into the spatial epidemiology of hepatitis C infection: systematic synthesis of area-level determinants and spatiotemporal analyses (Feb 2025)
Jinkook Lee
Jinkook Lee’s USC research draws on psychiatry and mental health, health, and demography, with recent studies on diabetes in India, cognitive assessment adaptation, and the health implications of human history.
Activity over the last year: 41 indexed journal articles.
Top publications:
- 50,000 years of evolutionary history of India: Impact on health and disease variation (Jun 2025)
- Prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control of diabetes in India: a nationally representative survey of adults aged 45 years and older (Aug 2025)
- Recommended best practices for construct-centered adaptation of the Harmonized Cognitive Assessment Protocol (Oct 2025)
Paul M. Thompson
Paul M. Thompson’s USC publications focus on radiology, cognitive neuroscience, and psychiatry and mental health, including white matter abnormalities in aging and Alzheimer disease, schizophrenia-spectrum imaging, and diffusion MRI harmonization.
Activity over the last year: 50 indexed journal articles.
Top publications:
- White Matter Abnormalities and Cognition in Aging and Alzheimer Disease (Jun 2025)
- Estimating Multimodal Structural Brain Variability in Schizophrenia Spectrum Disorders: A Worldwide ENIGMA Study (Feb 2025)
- Lifespan reference curves for harmonizing multi-site regional brain white matter metrics from diffusion MRI (May 2025)
Sukgu M. Han
Sukgu M. Han’s recent USC work connects pulmonary and respiratory medicine, cardiology and cardiovascular medicine, and surgery, with studies on vascular complications, complex aortic repair, and endovascular outcomes.
Activity over the last year: 36 indexed journal articles.
Top publications:
- Risk of lower extremity complications with GLP-1 receptor agonists, SGLT2 inhibitors, and DPP-4 inhibitors in peripheral artery disease (Nov 2025)
- Low-profile endografts are associated with increased risk of type I/III endoleaks at midterm follow-up of 1220 physician-modified fenestrated, branched endovascular repairs for complex abdominal and thoracoabdominal aortic aneurysms (Aug 2025)
- One-year outcomes from the pivotal trial of a four-branch off-the-shelf solution to treat pararenal and extent IV thoracoabdominal aortic aneurysms (Jun 2025)
Nathanael D. Heckmann
Nathanael D. Heckmann’s USC research links surgery and epidemiology through studies of GLP-1 receptor agonists in osteoarthritis, predictor variables for periprosthetic joint infection, and total joint arthroplasty outcomes.
Activity over the last year: 30 indexed journal articles.
Top publications:
- The Impact of Contemporary Glucagon-like Peptide-1 Receptor Agonists on the Onset, Severity, and Conversion to Arthroplasty in Hip and Knee Osteoarthritis (Jan 2025)
- The Limited Utility of Hemoglobin A1c as a Predictor for Periprosthetic Joint Infection Following Total Joint Arthroplasty: A Continuous Variable Analysis (Jan 2025)
- Albumin as a Predictor of Periprosthetic Joint Infection Following Total Joint Arthroplasty: Identifying a New Data-Driven Threshold Utilizing a Continuous Variable Analysis (Feb 2025)
Jennifer L. Hsiao
Jennifer L. Hsiao’s USC publications span dermatology and surgery, with recent work on metastatic cutaneous Crohn disease, hidradenitis suppurativa, and treatment guidance for biologic therapies.
Activity over the last year: 39 indexed journal articles.
Top publications:
- Delphi Panel for the Development of Diagnostic Criteria for Metastatic Cutaneous Crohn Disease (May 2025)
- Current Treatments and Future Directions for Hidradenitis Suppurativa: a Narrative Review of Completed and Ongoing Phase 3 Clinical Trials of Biologic Therapies (Jul 2025)
- Comprehensive and Updated Algorithm of Hidradenitis Suppurativa Management from the Experts (Apr 2025)
Emma Nichols
Emma Nichols’s USC research brings together psychiatry and mental health, physiology, and health, toxicology and mutagenesis, with recent studies on Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis, Lewy body disease, and cognitive functioning across contexts.
Activity over the last year: 29 indexed journal articles.
Top publications:
- New landscape of the diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease (Sep 2025)
- Sex Differences in Associations of Lewy Body Disease with Alzheimer's Disease and Cognitive Decline (Jul 2025)
- The association between adult child education and cognitive functioning among older parents: A cross‐national comparison of diverse contexts (Jan 2025)
What University of Southern California's Medicine Community Is Working On
Across the featured USC researchers, psychiatry and mental health and surgery appear most often, suggesting strong activity at the intersection of clinical care, brain health, and patient outcomes. Epidemiology and physiology also recur frequently, pointing to a community that is not only treating disease but also measuring patterns, testing predictors, and refining how conditions are understood across populations. Together, the subfields show a broad medical research environment where disease mechanisms, diagnostics, and interventions are being studied side by side.- Psychiatry and Mental health - seen across 3 of the featured researchers
- Surgery - seen across 3 of the featured researchers
- Epidemiology - seen across 2 of the featured researchers
- Physiology - seen across 2 of the featured researchers
- Obstetrics and Gynecology - seen across 1 of the featured researchers
Together, these researchers show how USC contributes to medicine through a mix of clinical insight, data-driven analysis, and cross-disciplinary collaboration. If you’re exploring similar work, keep reading through the featured profiles to find topics, methods, and subfields that may connect with your own interests. For researchers looking to streamline citation discovery, manuscript formatting, or submission prep, Resub can also help support the workflow behind the writing.
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