Michael A. Ainsworth (associate professor, Internal Medicine, and associate dean for regional medical education, School of Medicine) was elected to the Association of American Medical Colleges' Research in Medical Education Program Committee. Typically only one new physician is elected to this nationwide committee each year.
Garland D. Anderson (Jennie Sealy Smith Distinguished Chair, Obstetrics and Gynecology) was named chairman of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development's Maternal Fetal Medicine Unit's Network Steering Committee. He will serve for at least two years in this capacity.
Byron J. Bailey (chair and Wiess Professor, Otolaryngology) was recognized by the 78th Legislature of the State of Texas for his significant contributions to the field of medicine.
Randall Goldblum (director, Pediatric Child Health Research Center) received a two-year, $250,000 grant from the Environmental Protection Agency for research related to the increasing prevalence of allergic disease—including asthma—in developed countries over the last twenty years. Goldblum and his team will study how pollutants in the environment may affect allergen-producing plants, possibly enhancing their production of some allergenic proteins.
Clifford Houston (professor, Microbiology and Immunology, and associate vice president, Educational Outreach) has been appointed deputy associate administrator for education at NASA. Houston will maintain his positions at UTMB during his two-year appointment, which he will spend at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C.
Terry A. McNearney (associate professor, Internal Medicine) and Karin N. Westlund High (professor, Anatomy and Neurosciences) received a $300,000 grant from the Dana Foundation for arthritis research. They are examining the human nervous system's role in the development of arthritis and are studying how neurotransmitters also communicate with cells in the joints to cause inflammation and arthritis. McNearney says that the research could produce a new arthritis treatment within the next five years.
William Mitch (chair, Internal Medicine) received the Malpighi Award from the Italian-Sicilian Society of Nephrology for research into the mechanisms causing complications of kidney failure. Mitch's research examines why patients with kidney disease lose muscle strength and how this loss can be prevented.
Fannie E. Smith (assistant professor of endocrinology, Internal Medicine, and director of adult diabetes and diabetes education, Nelda C. and H.J. Lutcher Stark Diabetes Center) and Helen K. Li (associate professor and director of vitreoretinal diseases and surgery, Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences) were named to separate American Diabetes Association panels. Smith joined the board of the association's Houston Area Council and Li accepted a three-year term on the association's National Research Grant Review Panel.
UTMB President John D. Stobo was elected to a three-year term to the national Institute of Medicine Council. The council is the governing board of the Institute of Medicine, a private, non-profit organization that advises Congress and various federal agencies on issues relating to medicine.
For his contributions to pain research, William D. Willis (chair, Anatomy and Neurosciences, and director, Marine Biomedical Institute) was selected by the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic to receive its J.E. Purkyne Honorary Medal for Merit in the Biological Sciences.
William J. Winslade (Institute for the Medical Humanities) was awarded the 2002 Pellegrino Medal from the Healthcare Ethics and Law Institute. The award honors individuals recognized nationally as leaders for contributions to health care ethics in the selfless spirit of Edmund D. Pellegrino, who has been called the father of the American bioethics movement.
In Memory
Robert K. Bing , 74, professor and dean emeritus of the School of Allied Health Sciences, died May 15, 2003. See profile of Dean Bing on page 26 of the October 2001 issue of UTMB Quarterly , www.utmb.edu/utmbmagazine.
Tung Van Dinh , 72, professor of obstetrics and gynecology and of pathology, as well as an inaugural Osler Scholar, died May 10, 2003. See profile of Dr. Tung on page 34 of the Summer 2002 issue of UTMB Quarterly , www.utmb.edu/utmbmagazine.