Dr. Anthony Atala Is the 2026–2027 ACS President-Elect

Renowned urologist and regenerative medicine pioneer Anthony Atala, MD, FACS, was elected 2026–2027 President-Elect of the ACS during the Annual Business Meeting of Members yesterday. Steven D. Wexner, MD, FACS, and Steven M. Roser, DMD, MD, FACS, also were elected First Vice-President-Elect and Second Vice-President-Elect, respectively.

President-Elect

Dr. Atala is the G. Link Professor and Director of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine (WFIRM) and the W. H. Boyce Professor of Urology at Wake Forest School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Born in Lima, Peru, and raised in Coral Gables, Florida, Dr. Atala earned his medical degree and completed his urology residency at the University of Louisville in Kentucky. He later completed a clinical and research fellowship at Boston Children’s Hospital in Massachusetts.

A practicing pediatric urologist, Dr. Atala is internationally recognized for his work in regenerative medicine. At WFIRM, he leads a team of hundreds of researchers working to develop regenerative medicine technologies, including engineered tissues and organs. His research has contributed to more than 15 technologies that have been used clinically, including applications involving muscle, urethral, and skin tissues. He also has helped advance 3D bioprinting technologies for engineering tissues.

His work has earned numerous honors, including election to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies of Sciences in 2011 and the ACS Jacobson Innovation Award in 2022.

Dr. Atala has served in ACS leadership roles for more than 25 years, beginning with the Advisory Council for Urology in 2001. He served 6 years on the Board of Governors and 9 years on the Board of Regents (BoR), including as Chair from 2023 to 2024. His ACS service also has included work in health policy, finance, research, and member services.

Vice-Presidents-Elect

Dr. Wexner, physician executive director and system chair for colorectal surgery at MedStar Health and professor of surgery at Georgetown University School of Medicine in Washington, DC, is the First Vice-President-Elect.

He has served in ACS leadership roles for nearly 3 decades, including on the Advisory Council for Colon and Rectal Surgery, Board of Governors, and BoR. He was Vice-Chair of the BoR from 2020 to 2021. Dr. Wexner also has played a significant role in the development of the ACS National Accreditation Program for Rectal Cancer and currently serves as its Immediate Past Chair.

Before joining MedStar Health, Dr. Wexner was director of the Ellen Leifer Shulman and Steven Shulman Digestive Disease Center at Cleveland Clinic Florida in Weston and was chair for more than 30 years of the Department of Colorectal Surgery. He remains emeritus chair.

Dr. Roser, an oral and maxillofacial surgeon, is the Second Vice-President-Elect. He is the Delos Hill Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, a professor of surgery, and residency program director for oral and maxillofacial surgery at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.

Dr. Roser has a loangstanding commitment to global surgical care and has participated in humanitarian surgical programs that provide procedures such as cleft palate repair. His work has included affiliations with the Missions Abroad Program of Healing the Children Northeast in Central and South America and the Emory Haiti Alliance in Haiti’s Central Plateau. Dr. Roser received the 2026 International Surgical Volunteerism Award as part of the ACS/Pfizer Surgical Volunteerism and Humanitarian Awards.

His ACS leadership roles have included Chair of the Advisory Council for Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery and Chair of the Advisory Council Chairs. He currently is a member of the Committee on Global Engagement through ACS H.O.P.E. (Health Outreach Program for Equity in Global Surgery), the College’s initiative focused on equitable access to surgical care worldwide.