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Dr. Chalak is a tenured, endowed physician-scientist in the Division of Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine at UT Southwestern Medical Center (UTSW). She also serves as the Chief of Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine in UTSW’s Department of Pediatrics. Over the past 20 years, Dr. Chalak has maintained a sustained research program funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In 2018, she established UTSW’s clinical Neurological Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NeuroNICU) program, followed by the Fetal and Neonatal Neurology Fellowship Training Program in 2019. Her efforts have led to the creation of a comprehensive research, fellowship, and clinical program in Neonatal Neurology. Her guiding principle is encapsulated in her logo: “Be you, be authentic, be true. The sky is the limit.”
Dr. Chalak has dedicated the past decade to mentoring numerous clinical scholars, postdocs, and fellows who are now thriving in academia, successfully transitioning from KL2/K23 programs. In 2019, she initiated the ‘Clinical Faculty Productivity Hubs’ to enhance scholarly collaboration and productivity within her division. These hubs bring together a critical mass of faculty for idea exchange and project involvement, which has already doubled the division's yearly number of published papers. In 2021, Dr. Chalak was honored with UTSW’s Leaders in Clinical Excellence Best Mentor Award, recognizing her exceptional commitment and effectiveness as a mentor to healthcare providers. Her laboratory now includes over 20 researchers.
Dr. Chalak’s lab focuses on improving neonatal neurologic care and outcomes for vulnerable babies through the NeuroNICU clinical program, Neonatal Neurology Fellowship, and NIH research program. Her research addresses asphyxia, hypothermia, and neonatal brain injury, supported by multiple federally funded awards. Current projects include studying cerebrovascular autoregulation and neuronal biomarkers in hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE), as well as neuronal and inflammatory biomarkers in neuronal injury pathways. She has led the PRIME mild asphyxia collaborative study and pioneered a “Neurovascular bundle” for real-time evaluation of the coupling of cerebral blood flow and neuronal activity in newborns with asphyxia. Her interdisciplinary research team includes physiologists and biomedical engineers working on this novel neurovascular bundle. Dr. Chalak’s research integrates translational studies in a piglet model of asphyxia with clinical trials aimed at optimizing neuroprotection and developing novel physiological biomarkers of brain health. Her collaborative efforts include nationally funded networks such as the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) and the Neonatal Research Network (NRN).
Dr. Chalak serves as the co-Chair of the Newborn Brain Society (NBS) Research and Quality Committee, a standing NIH reviewer for the NINDS NST Study Section, and Chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Section on Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine Fellow Western Conference on Perinatal Research. She has also served on the executive council of the Society for Pediatric Research (SPR) and the council of the American Pediatric Society (APS). Additionally, she is a member of several professional organizations, including the Perinatal Research Society and the International Perinatal Collegium. Dr. Chalak has delivered numerous lectures and presentations and authored over 150 publications focused on neonatal brain injury research. She serves as Associate Section Editor of Pediatric Research and as a reviewer for numerous medical and scientific journals.