Yale President Richard C. Levin applauds after announcing the appointment of Susan Hockfield, right, as provost in mid-December.

Neurobiologist named university provost

Susan Hockfield, a basic scientist and a dean, becomes first medical school faculty member to hold post.

In another era, the appointment of Susan Hockfield, Ph.D., as provost might have been remarkable because of her gender. But since the 1970s, three other women—Hannah H. Gray, Judith Rodin and Alison F. Richard—have held Yale’s top academic post.

“What is perhaps more unusual in my appointment as provost at Yale is that I’m a scientist,” Hockfield, the William Edward Gilbert Professor of Neurobiology, said in December. Hockfield, who was appointed dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in 1998 and reappointed last fall to that post by President Richard C. Levin, is the first medical school faculty member to hold either position.

In her new job, she is the university’s chief educational and administrative officer, overseeing academic policies and activities throughout the university. All deans report to her, and she has institutional responsibility for the allocation of resources, chairing the university’s budget committee.

In an interview, Hockfield said she is excited by the opportunity to serve during “a terrific new era for Yale” in which the university is focusing on science and engineering, internationalism, the rebuilding of the campus and, most recently, review of the Yale College curriculum. “The university is more unified and the campuses really talk to one another,” Hockfield said. And compared to a decade ago, a time when the physical plant had declined drastically, its buildings and grounds are in great shape. “Yale is now in a fabulous period of renewal. Who would have guessed that a 300-year-old university could turn as sharply and move as quickly?”

Hockfield, who joined the Yale faculty in 1985, has retained her laboratory on the third floor of Sterling Hall of Medicine while serving as graduate school dean. She directs a program of research focusing on the development of the mammalian brain, with a special interest in the progression of brain tumors, especially gliomas. She is the author of more than 90 scientific papers and is primary author of the text Molecular Probes of the Nervous System: Selected Methods for Antibody and Nucleic Acid Probes. She hopes to continue her scientific work while serving as provost but doesn’t yet know to what extent that will be possible. Her focus is on the work ahead.

“I have said that being graduate school dean is the best job in the university, because of the breadth and diversity of the academic activities of the graduate school,” she said. “But the provost engages an even larger array.”

Hockfield succeeds Alison Richard, an anthropologist who has been named vice-chancellor of Cambridge University in the United Kingdom. President Levin announced in January that Hockfield will be succeeded as graduate school dean by Peter Salovey, Ph.D., chair of the Department of Psychology and deputy director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Research on AIDS, based at the School of Public Health.

Three professors, authorities in genetics and immunology, receive Sterling honor

Flavell

Three faculty members at the School of Medicine have been named to Sterling chairs, one of the university’s highest tributes.

Richard A. Flavell, Ph.D., known for his pioneering research on gene structure and critical genes of the immune system, has been appointed Sterling Professor of Immunology. Richard P. Lifton, M.D., Ph.D., the newly designated Sterling Professor of Genetics, has identified genes that can make people susceptible to cardiovascular disease, renal disease and osteoporosis. Ira Mellman, Ph.D., the new Sterling Professor of Cell Biology, is studying how individual cells organize their internal components to accomplish higher-order functions relevant to cancer and the body’s natural immunity to cancer.

Lifton

Flavell’s laboratory is trying to understand how the immune system recognizes and responds to infectious agents and why it sometimes attacks the body’s own cells. Since 1988, Flavell has served as chair of the Section of Immunobiology at the School of Medicine and as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) investigator.

Lifton received the 2002 Basic Research Prize from the American Heart Association for his discovery of mutations that cause hypertension and low blood pressure, findings that have established the central role of the kidney in blood pressure regulation and allowed Lifton and colleagues to identify new therapeutic targets. He is chair of the Department of Genetics and has been an HHMI investigator since 1994.

Mellman

Mellman is exploring fundamental questions of membrane traffic-how molecules find each other and their intended sites of residence inside cells. His research team has focused on two areas: identifying the molecular mechanisms responsible for directing membrane components to their correct locations in epithelial cells, neurons and lymphocytes; and determining how the immune system processes antigens, agents that induce the formation of protective responses to foreign invaders as well as to cancer cells. A member of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research since 1999, Mellman chairs the Department of Cell Biology at Yale.

Distinguished company

Edmund Crelin, professor emeritus of surgery, and student Harsimran Singh listen to remarks by Deputy Dean Herbert Chase at a reception for the founding members of the Society of Distinguished Teachers in September.

Founding members of the new Society of Distinguished Teachers gathered for a reception on September 24 in the Beaumont Room. More than 60 members attended, all recipients of major teaching honors such as the Bohmfalk Prize, the Francis Gilman Blake Award, the Leah M. Lowenstein Prize, the Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey Humanism in Medicine Faculty Award and the Betsy Winters House Staff Award. Society members are expected to participate in curriculum discussions, advise junior faculty and mentor students. The society was formed to identify and reward outstanding teachers in an era of increasing demands on the time of both clinicians and basic scientists. The society will create term-limited chairs in medical education, with financial support. The society will also develop educational leaders to foster innovation in the curriculum. Members of the society will be asked to help raise funds for these initiatives.

Nancy Angoff, associate dean for student affairs, with student Michael Shapiro, who portrayed her in his class’s second-year show last year.		Ralph Horwitz, chair of medicine, Marie Egan, associate professor of pediatrics, and Michele Barry, professor of medicine and public health.

Society members Leo Cooney Jr., professor of geriatric medicine, and Lynn Tanoue, associate professor of medicine

Notes

Elizabeth H. Bradley, M.B.A., Ph.D. ’97, associate professor of epidemiology and public health, left, and Barbara I. Kazmierczak, M.S., M.D., Ph.D., assistant professor of medicine and microbial pathogenesis, were recipients of the 2002 Donaghue Investigator Program Awards for Health-Related Research. The awards, announced in October by the Patrick and Catherine Weldon Donaghue Medical Research Foundation, provide grants of $100,000 a year for five years to prepare medical researchers for an independent research career and for leadership in research to benefit human life. Bradley’s research objective over the five-year period is to examine why clinical care often deviates from clinical guidelines that are widely supported by scientific evidence. She is the first recipient from Yale’s School of Public Health. Kazmierczak is interested in determining how the lung defends itself against microbial pathogens and hopes to develop a better understanding of how epithelial cells contribute to innate and acquired immunity to reduce the risk of opportunistic infections.

John A. Elefteriades, M.D. ’76, HS ’83, professor and chief of cardiothoracic surgery, has received several honors this year, including appointment to the editorial board of the American Journal of Cardiology, election to a three-year term on the American College of Cardiology Board of Governor’s Steering Committee and appointment as secretary of the International College of Angiology for a two-year term. Elefteriades also delivered the annual Stanley K. Brockman Visiting Lecture at MCP Hahnemann University School of Medicine in June.

Robert H. Gifford, M.D., HS ’67, professor emeritus of medicine, was honored in May upon his “second” retirement, after two years of teaching science to the students of Sacred Heart/St. Peter’s School. A benefit to honor Gifford raised $25,000 for scholarships. Faculty at the school also created the Robert H. Gifford Science Award, which will be given annually to an outstanding science student.

Gifford brought the first science curriculum to the parochial school after he retired from Yale in 2000 as the medical school’s deputy dean for education. The addition of the science program has allowed the students to gain an appreciation for how scientists collect information and the importance of paying attention to detail.

R. Lawrence Moss, M.D., associate professor of surgery and a recent addition to the School of Medicine faculty, has joined the staff at the Yale-New Haven Children’s Hospital as surgeon-in-chief. He is known for his leadership in clinical research in children’s surgery and the development of evidence-based surgery. Moss is spearheading a clinical trial in 12 centers across the country to investigate different ways of treating premature newborns who suffer from necrotizing enterocolitis, a severe inflammatory disorder of the intestines.

Frederick Naftolin, M.D., D.Phil., professor of obstetrics and gynecology and professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology, received the Arnaldo Bruno International Prize for Gynecology from the National Academy of Italy. The prize was presented in June by the president of the academy. Also present at the award ceremony was the president of the Republic of Italy. Naftolin, honored for his “superior scientific activity,” has spent more than three decades studying the metabolism and action of ovarian steroid hormones, particularly estrogen and its congeners.

Pasko Rakic, M.D., Ph.D., chair and professor of neurobiology and the Dorys McConnell Duberg Professor of Neuroscience, received the 15th annual Bristol-Myers Award for Distinguished Achievement in Neuroscience Research for his discovery of the principles and molecular mechanisms of neuronal migration. He was awarded $50,000 and a commemorative medallion. The latest research from Rakic’s laboratory indicates that genes associated with neuronal stem cell differentiation in early development also have a role in maintaining neuronal structure and their connections in the adult brain, thereby participating in the origin of neurodegenerative diseases.

Alan C. Sartorelli, Ph.D., the Alfred Gilman Professor of Pharmacology, and Elias Lolis, Ph.D., associate professor of pharmacology, were among the recipients of the 2002 Glaxo-SmithKline Drug Discovery and Development Award announced in October. Six researchers will split a $500,000 unrestricted research award to support development of HIV/AIDS therapeutics. Sartorelli will receive $100,000 for his research, which focuses on making certain enzyme inhibitors work more effectively. Lolis is attempting to counter the likely side effects of some of the experimental entry inhibitor drugs.

Douglas W. Vaughn, M.D., D.D.S., assistant professor of anesthesiology, has been appointed medical director of perioperative services at Yale-New Haven Hospital, where he served as clinical director for the Department of Anesthesiology. In his new position, Vaughn will work to streamline operations, improve operating room efficiency and continue excellence in patient care and safety.