Yale Medicine-Faculty News

Senior faculty honored with endowed professorships

Five faculty members with appointments at the School of Medicine were recently named to endowed chairs.

Ronald S. Duman, Ph.D., was appointed the Elizabeth Mears and House Jameson Professor of Psychiatry. He has been on the Yale faculty since 1988, most recently as a professor of psychiatry and pharmacology, and has worked on characterizing the molecular and cellular mechanisms that mediate the long-term effects of psychotropic drugs and stress. His research suggests that antidepressant treatments increase the survival and health of neurons and alter their synaptic architecture. Duman’s laboratory has also identified several neuropeptide receptors that are expressed in drug reward and craving.

Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Susan Hockfield, Ph.D., was named the William Edward Gilbert Professor of Neurobiology. She joined the faculty in the Section of Neurobiology at the medical school in 1985 and has served as dean of the graduate school since 1998, overseeing the academic and administrative policies of the school, its 2,300 students and 750 faculty. Hockfield has sought to improve the quality of life for graduate students and increase opportunities for informal interaction between faculty and students. Her research work has looked at the molecular substrates involved in brain development, and she discovered a protein in the space around cells that is involved in early development and may play a role in brain tumors.

G. Shirleen Roeder, Ph.D., was appointed the Eugene Higgins Professor of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology. Also a professor of genetics, she was part of a Yale team that recently fully characterized the function of the yeast genome. She has studied the process of meiosis by isolating and characterizing yeast mutants defective in the process. She was named a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator in 1997. Roeder has been on the Yale faculty since 1981, and her work has appeared in the journals Cell and Science, among others.

Peter Salovey, Ph.D., a professor of epidemiology and public health and chair of the Department of Psychology, was named the Chris Argyris Professor of Psychology. He directs the Health, Emotion and Behavior Laboratory and with John D. Mayer coined the term “emotional intelligence” to describe how people understand, manage and use their feelings. He has focused on how feelings facilitate adaptive cognitive and behavioral functioning. Salovey has also investigated how public health messages can best encourage prevention and early detection behaviors for HIV/AIDS and cancer. He is deputy director of the Yale Center for Interdisciplinary Research on AIDS.

Robert M. Weiss, M.D., was named the Donald Guthrie Professor of Surgery. He is a specialist in pediatric urology and urologic surgery and was listed in the latest edition of “Best Doctors in America: Northeast Region.” His research has covered topics from the role of nitric oxide in urinary tract infections and the biochemical and functional changes in the bladders of diabetics to the use of pulse Doppler sonography in the diagnosis of urinary tract obstruction in children. He has been at Yale since 1967 and has served as chief of the Section of Urology since 1988. He also served as interim chair of the Department of Surgery. Weiss received a MERIT Award from the National Institutes of Health for his work on age-dependent factors in ureteral-vesical function and the Urodynamic Society’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

˜˜˜ NOTES

For their dedication to patients, students and the community, the husband-and-wife team of Frank Bia, M.D., and Margaret Bia, M.D., were nominated by Yale medical students for the 2001 AAMC Humanism in Medical Education Award. The nomination was announced April 5 at a reception in the third floor lounge of the Hope Building. “The Bias treat patients and students fairly and ethically, regardless of gender, race or lifestyle options,” wrote one student quoted in the nomination. “Their mission,” wrote another,“is to serve people in need and in this way they serve the community every day.” The American Association of Medical Colleges, which will announce the final recipient at its annual meeting in November, created the award in 1999 with sponsorship from the Pfizer Corporation.

Irwin M. Braverman, M.D. ’55, HS ’56, professor of dermatology, was honored at a Yale symposium on April 28 to celebrate his career at Yale as an outstanding clinician and researcher. Braverman has provided insight into a wide range of cutaneous diseases, from lupus to hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia to T-cell lymphoma. He is also a researcher and educator on the aging of the skin and cutaneous microcirculation. With the help of Jacqueline Dolev, M.D. ’01, and Linda Friedlaender, curator of education at the Yale Center for British Art, he developed a tutorial, the “British Museum Project,” that uses highly detailed original works of art to train first-year Yale medical students to become more careful observers.

Daniel C. DiMaio, M.D., Ph.D., professor of genetics, was honored by the Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences for exemplary mentoring of graduate students. He was one of three winning faculty mentors who were chosen by the Graduate Student Assembly’s Awards and Evaluation Committee, working with the Office of Teaching Fellow Preparation and Development, from nominations made by students. DiMaio’s research focuses on the molecular biology of tumor viruses and the mechanisms by which they affect cell proliferation and induce the development of cancer. One student commented in nominating DiMaio, “He has made me a more accountable scientist, a better critical thinker and has inspired me toward a career in academic research and teaching.”

Howard P. Forman, M.D., associate professor of diagnostic radiology and vice chair of finance and administration in the Department of Diagnostic Radiology, has been awarded a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellowship. He was one of six fellows chosen to participate in a one-year orientation and work experience program to help mid-career health professionals assume leadership roles in health policy and management. Forman is coordinator of Yale’s newly implemented M.D./M.B.A. joint degree program. He also holds appointments in the Department of Economics and at the Yale School of Management and teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in health care finance and health economics.

Gary E. Friedlaender, M.D., HS ’74, the Wayne O. Southwick Professor and chair of orthopaedics and rehabilitation, was named chair of the Council of Musculoskeletal Specialty Societies (COMSS) of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons at its 68th annual meeting in March in San Francisco. As COMSS chair, he will serve on the academy’s board of directors. Already active in the academy, Friedlaender is chair of the research committee and Kappa Delta research award committee. He is also a member of the Council on Education, Council on Research, Bone and Joint Decade committee and Task Force on Patient-Physician Communication.

On June 26, the School of Medicine announced the completion of a fund-raising effort that will establish the first endowed professorship in the Department of Anesthesiology and will honor Nicholas M. Greene, M.D., Yale’s first professor of anesthesiology and founding chair of the department. A graduate of Yale College, Greene received his medical degree from Columbia University in 1946. He had an enormous influence on medicine at Yale and around the world, and is credited with transforming the anesthesia service at Yale from a technical subspecialty of surgery into its own medical and academic discipline. In addition, an anonymous donor has established the Betty Greene Research Fund in Anesthesiology for use at the discretion of the incumbent of the Greene Chair.

Bonnie Kaplan, Ph.D., lecturer in anesthesiology (medical informatics), was recently inducted into the American College of Medical Informatics (ACMI) and also received the President’s Award from the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA). Fellowship in ACMI recognizes leaders in the science and application of medical informatics. Kaplan was inducted during a dinner held at the AMIA 2000 Annual Symposium in Los Angeles last November. The President’s Award, which Kaplan received at the same conference, recognized her work in spearheading the formulation of AMIA’s Strategic Vision in Consumer Health Informatics and as chair of the People and Organizational Issues Working Group. Kaplan is also a member of Yale’s Interdisciplinary Bioethics Project, president of Kaplan Associates and a senior scientist at Boston University’s Medical Information Systems Unit.

Ilona S. Kickbusch, Ph.D., professor of public health and of political science and head of the division of global health, received the Andrija Stampar Medal from the Association of Schools of Public Health in the European Region during the organization’s annual conference in Hungary on September 22. Kickbush was honored for her lifelong distinguished service to public health.

James F. Leckman, M.D., the Neison Harris Professor of Child Psychiatry, Psychiatry and Pediatrics, received a Distinguished Alumni Award at a meeting of the College of Wooster’s Alumni Association on June 9 in Wooster, Ohio. Leckman graduated from Wooster in 1969. He first came to Yale as a postdoctoral fellow in 1976 and now serves as director of research at the Child Study Center.

Stephen E. Malawista, M.D., HS ’60, professor of medicine, has been named a Guggenheim Fellow by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Fellows are appointed on the basis of unusually impressive achievement and exceptional promise for future accomplishment. During the current sabbatical year he will study motile function of human white blood cells, in the context of the inflammatory response, at the Hôpital de la Salpêtrière, Paris.

Ravinder Nath, Ph.D., professor of therapeutic radiology and head of the section of radiological physics, received the William D. Collidge Award in July from the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM) at a special ceremony and reception during the AAPM meeting in Salt Lake City. The Collidge Award, the association’s highest honor, recognizes distinguished contributions to medical physics.

Pasko Rakic, M.D., Ph.D., chair of the Section of Neurobiology and the Dorys McConnell Duberg Professor of Neuroscience, gave the 71st James Arthur Lecture on the “Evolution of Neocortex: Lessons from Embryoarcheology” at the American Museum of Natural History in the spring of 2001. The objective of Rakic’s research is to better understand the molecular mechanisms that govern cellular events during development of the mammalian brain, including neurogenesis, neuronal migration and synaptogenesis. He emphasized that advances in understanding corticogenesis in the embryo provide insight into how spontaneous gene mutations that regulate the early stages of corticogenesis may have determined the species-specific size and basic organization of the cerebral cortex.

Alan C. Sartorelli, Ph.D., the Alfred Gilman Professor of Pharmacology, received the 20th American Association for Cancer Research-Bruce F. Cain Memorial Award in March, which honors outstanding preclinical research leading to the improved care of cancer patients. He was recognized for his pioneering work in cancer pharmacology. He is also the former chair of the Department of Pharmacology and former director of the Yale Comprehensive Cancer Center. His contributions to the evaluation of the role of tumor cell hypoxia in anticancer drug action and in targeting this important cellular difference in human tumors for therapeutic intervention are of fundamental importance in this field.

M. Bruce Shields, M.D., professor and chair of ophthalmology and visual science, was elected to serve as chair of the American Board of Ophthalmology, a national organization that certifies more than 500 ophthalmologists each year. Shields will assume the position of vice chair of the organization’s board of directors in 2002, and will become chair in 2003. His duties will include helping to supervise the hundreds of examiners who administer the written and oral certification exams and developing new strategies for certifying ophthalmologists.

—Claire Bessinger

Send faculty news items to: Claire Bessinger, Yale Medicine Publications, P.O. Box 7612, New Haven, CT 06519-0612.