About Us
The John Greene Society was founded in 2002, taking its name from Dr. John C. Greene, Dean Emeritus at UCSF, whose leadership was instrumental in the dental school's rise to prominence as a premier research institution, and who was much beloved by students and faculty alike. A major goal at the time was to encourage active student participation in meaningful research, bringing student research into harmony with the quality investigations being conducted by the UCSF dental faculty.
Since that time, the John Greene Society has shown tremendous growth as an organization. Enrollment in the JGS has increased in each year of its existence, now standing at nearly one third of the pre-doctoral student body at the School of Dentistry. The JGS is one of the most recognizable, vocal, and respected student groups on campus. Student research participation at UCSF is at an all-time high, with dozens of students conducting semester-long fellowships each year, and many more traveling to present their findings at conferences across California, the country and the world.
In The News
“You’re a cancer survivor. People talk about that a lot, but they don’t talk about quality of life afterwards. They survived the cancer! But then you flip the coin and on the other side there’s all the health issues that you have to deal with,” says Sarah Knox, PhD, Professor in the Department of Cell and Tissue Biology in the UCSF School of Dentistry. “You don’t think about what’s going to happen if you lose the ability to make saliva.”
​
The Knox Lab is developing a therapeutic to regenerate damaged salivary glands.
UCSF School of Dentistry again led the nation in funding from the 2023 National Institutes of Health (NIH) among dental schools.
​
In 2023, UCSF Dentistry’s 63 awards garnered over 26 million dollars in total funding, the most ever for UCSF Dentistry. This accomplishment underscored the institution's dedication to excellence and its ability to attract substantial support for its initiatives. While nearly half of the School’s NIH funding is from the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, half comes from other NIH institutes and centers, including one-fifth from the National Institute of Minority Health and Health Disparities.
Cutting-edge research and new innovations in clinical care were on full display at UCSF School of Dentistry’s annual Research and Clinical Excellence Day (RCED) on October 11. In its 20th year, the event celebrated the wide-ranging discovery happening across the school, with special focus on the research projects of dental students, graduate students, residents, postdoctoral fellows and research associates.