Through almost five decades of persistence, collaboration, and curiosity, University of Iowa researchers have helped transform cystic fibrosis (CF) from a fatal childhood illness into a manageable condition for many—changing lives and redefining what’s possible in medicine.

Starting in the 1980s, UI physicians and scientists led by Michael J. Welsh, MD, UI professor of internal medicine and winner of the 2025 Lasker-DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award, made landmark discoveries that revealed how the protein that underlies this lethal genetic disease normally works and what goes wrong in people with CF.

Their findings opened up the possibility of finding small molecules that could correct the malfunctioning protein and laid the foundation for today’s life-saving CF drugs. 

Today, around 90% of people with CF are candidates for these therapies, and the changes in patients’ outcomes are remarkable: For patients born between 1999-2003 — before these therapies existed — their average life span was mid 30s. For babies born now, life expectancy can be up to 80.