Elazer Edelman,Thomas D. and Virginia W. Cabot Professor of Health Sciences and Technology at MIT and HMS professor of medicine and senior physician in the Cardiovascular Division of the Brigham and Women’s Hospital is the recipient of the 2011 Katz Prize in Cardiovascular Research. The prize was established to honor physician scientists and recognizes outstanding lifetime achievement in cardiovascular research and/or education with international impact. Edelman’s research interests combine his scientific and medical training. His work integrates multiple disciplines including polymer based controlled and modulated drug delivery; growth factor biology and biochemistry; tissue engineering; biomaterials-tissue interactions and the vascular response to injury. He uses elements of continuum mechanics, digital signal processing and polymeric controlled release technology to examine the cellular and molecular mechanisms that produce accelerated atherosclerosis and transform stable coronary artery disease to unstable coronary syndromes. Edelman received his prize and presented his work at Columbia University Oct. 27, 2011.
Shelley Hurwitz, HMS assistant professor of medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital, was elected to the International Statistical Institute. Hurwitz, who is also the director of biostatistics at the hospital's Center for Clinical Investigation, and the chair of the Committee on Professional Ethics in Statistics of the American Statistical Association, was selected for her expertise and leadership in statistical consulting, her national and international educational initiatives and her dedication to the promotion of ethical statistical practice and responsibility among statisticians working in the biomedical sciences.
Donald Ingber, founding director of the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, has received the 2011 Holst Medal in recognition of his pioneering work exploring the cellular mechanisms that contribute to mechanical control of tissue and organ development, and his groundbreaking development of bio-inspired technologies, ranging from Organ-on-Chip replacements for animal studies, to new engineering approaches for whole organ engineering. Ingber is the Judah Folkman Professor of Vascular Biology at Harvard Medical School, professor of bioengineering at Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, and a senior research associate in the Vascular Biology Program at Children’s Hospital Boston. This year’s Holst events were dedicated to the global health issue of heart disease. At the Wyss Institute, Ingber and core faculty member Kevin Kit Parker co-lead a project funded by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and National Institutes of Health to develop a “Heart-Lung Micromachine” that will replicate the complex physiological functions and mechanical microenvironment of a human breathing lung and beating heart. The award was presented at the High Tech Campus Eindhoven in the Netherlands during a ceremony at the Holst Symposium in December, 2011.
The American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH) awarded its highest honor, the Bailey K. Ashford Medal, to Louise Ivers on Dec. 4, 2011. The ASTMH selected Ivers, HMS assistant professor of global health and social medicine and assistand professor of medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, to recognize her service as a clinician and contributor to strengthening health systems in Haiti over the past eight years and particularly for her leadership in responding to the devastating earthquake of January 12, 2010, and the cholera outbreak that came in its wake. Ivers is senior health and policy advisor with Partners in Health and associate physician at Brigham and Women’s. She conducted her work in Haiti with PIH, serving as leader of the HIV Equity Initiative, which has provided integrated HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention services to more than 8,000 rural patients over the last five years. She was also clinical director and then chief-of-mission with PIH in Haiti.
Joan Miller, Henry Willard Williams Professor of Ophthalmology and chief of ophthalmology at Massachusetts Eye and Ear Institute is one of eight winners of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce 2012 Pinnacle Awards. The awards honor women for workplace achievement, leadership and a commitment to enhance the quality of life in the region. Miller is the first female professor of ophthalmology at Harvard Medical School, and the first woman to serve as chair of the Department of Ophthalmology. She also serves as the director of Mass Eye and Ear’s Angiogenesis Laboratory, and is a vitreo-retinal physician in the Retina Service at the Infirmary. Miller has written 130 peer-reviewed papers, 50 book chapters and review articles, and is co-editor of the third edition of Albert and Jakobiec’s Principles and Practice of Ophthalmology. She has also been a named inventor on 14 patents, and, along with her colleagues at Mass Eye and Ear, has pioneered the development of photodynamic therapy, the first pharmacologic therapy to reduce and slow vision loss for age-related macular degeneration. An awards ceremony is scheduled for Jan. 26 at the Boston Marriott Copley Place in Boston.
R. Michael Scott, HMS professor of surgery and Christopher K. Fellows Chair in Pediatric Neurosurgery at Children’s Hospital Boston was awarded the prestigious Franc D. Ingraham Distinguished Service Award. Given by the American Association of Neurological Surgeons/CNS Section of Pediatric Neurological Surgery, the award is the highest honor given by the organization and recognizes individuals whose achievements have advanced the field of pediatric neurosurgery. Scott was presented with the award at the organization’s annual meeting in Austin, Texas on Dec. 1, 2011. Scott’s innovations include developing pial synangiosis for Moyamoya disease and novel advances in tumor, spinal, vascular, craniofacial endoscopic and epilepsy neurosurgery. In addition to the surgical and technical advancements created by Scott, he also established the Shillito Pediatric Neurosurgery Fellowship in 1991, which yearly supports an outstanding young neurosurgeon as he or she pursues intensive, post-graduate training in pediatric neurosurgery.
The Society for Neuroscience (SfN) announced the winners of major achievement awards during the 2011 annual meeting. Achievement awards give SfN the chance to recognize colleagues who have demonstrated an exceptional commitment to neuroscience, the advancement of women scientists throughout the field, as well as mentoring and outreach. Two HMS scientists received awards:
- Amar Sahay, lecturer on psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital, received one of two Janett Rosenberg Trubatch Career Development Awards. The award recognizes promise and achievement in the neuroscience field for early career professionals and includes a $2,000 prize. Sahay is engaged in developing a deeper understanding of adult-born neurons and their role in depression and affective disorders. He is currently transitioning to his own lab at Harvard University, where he will continue investigating the plasticity and function of adult-born neurons and neural stem cells.
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Margaret Livingstone, HMS professor of neurobiology, received the Mika Salpeter Lifetime Achievement Award. Established in 2000, the award recognizes individuals with outstanding career achievements in neuroscience who have also actively promoted the professional advancement of women in neuroscience. The award includes a $5,000 prize. The SfN recognized Livingstone for her considerable creativity and enthusiasm throughout her career as a scientist and mentor, and her desire to promote women in neuroscience. Livingstone has been vocal about women’s issues, particularly those related to work/family balance. Livingstone earned her PhD in 1981 from Harvard University. Her research has been instrumental in providing insight into visual systems and processing, particularly how we see color, depth and motion. Livingstone has also combined her scientific work with an interest in visual art. She has won acclaim with artists and art historians alike, and continues to seek ways to help further the understanding of art through science.
