Immunology Program Announces Leadership Changes

Photo by Jorg Meyer

Photo by Steve Gilbert

The Immunology Graduate Program at HMS announced new leadership changes in February. Michael Carroll, HMS professor of pediatrics (pathology) at the CBR Institute for Biomedical Research and Children’s Hospital Boston, became the program’s director after serving as interim director since March 2005. Shannon Turley, HMS assistant professor of pathology at the Dana–Farber Cancer Institute, became the associate director of the program. An active member of the Graduate Committee on Immunology, Turley studies T cell priming by dendritic cells in type 1 diabetes and pancreatic cancer. “I am delighted that Dr. Turley has accepted this position. She is a wonderful teacher and scientist. In her new role, she will make an important contribution to our graduate program,” said Carroll.

Schepens Named to French Legion of Honor

Photo courtesy of Consulate General of France in Boston

On March 21, Charles Schepens, HMS clinical professor emeritus of ophthalmology at Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary and Schepens Eye Research Institute, was given the insignia of Knight of the Legion of Honor by the French consul general. He died seven days later on March 28. The award recognized both Schepens’s well known contributions to the treatment of retinal diseases as well as his lesser known contributions to the French resistance in World War II.

The Legion of Honor award, established by Napoleon in 1802, is the most prestigious medal given by the French government. According to M. Gauthier, the French consul in Boston, “Usually such an award is made for outstanding contributions in a single career or field. Charles Schepens has distinguished himself twice over.”

HST Forum Charts New Directions in Research

Photos by John Rich

In everyday life, as in the annual Forum of the Harvard–MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology held on March 23 this year, people need to select one audio source from a cacophony of conversations and background noise. In the top photo, Adrian K.C. Lee, a doctoral candidate in the speech and hearing bioscience and technology program, explains how people’s attention helps them hear one source among many. One day, this understanding may lead to more sophisticated hearing aids.

An estimated 300 people roamed among the 77 research posters that spanned the range of medical and doctoral student research at the interface of life sciences, medicine, engineering, and business. One poster down from Lee, medical student Brittany Lee (bottom photo, no relation to Adrian) cautiously stopped short of claiming that her studies prove or disprove a controversial idea that Trypanosoma cruzi, the parasite that causes Chagas disease in the Americas, recruits the endoplasmic reticulum to help the muscle cells that harbor this organism evade destruction by the immune system.

Across the hall, graduate student Borjan Gagoski showed that he has figured out how to extract 2.3 hours worth of data from the noninvasive imaging method magnetic resonance spectroscopic imaging (MRSI) in less than eight minutes by collecting the information in a different way.

HST alumnus David Ho gave the keynote presentation. Ho is the founding scientific director and chief executive officer of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center and the Irene Diamond professor at Rockefeller University.

Ho may be best known for introducing and helping to prove the notion of combination antiretroviral therapies at a time when AIDS was uniformly fatal. In his talk, he reviewed the quantitative approach to studying the dynamics of HIV replication and the lymphocyte population that led to his realization that the adaptable virus can mutate daily in an infected person. A double mutation could occur over a few weeks and months. But a triple mutation is highly improbable.

The same line of reasoning is guiding his current vaccine studies. “It makes sense to present the immune system with four, five, or six different viral antigens,” he said during the question and answer session. Even then, it will be a race to expand the memory immune system faster than the virus can grow.

—Carol Cruzan Morton

Dental School Receives $5m Grant from Delta Dental

Delta Dental gave a $5 million Legacy of Leadership endowment to HSDM in 2005. The endowment will be used to establish four positions within the School: two endowed professorships focusing on oral health and epidemiology; a fellowship in minority oral health policy, involving the delivery of culturally competent oral health care; and a postdoctoral Delta Dental Dean’s Scholar, for a dental school graduate entering academia.

The Legacy of Leadership endowment addresses a need that affects dozens of schools across the country. Faced with severe staff shortages, dental schools are struggling to attract dental health professionals, particularly since the schools often compete with private companies offering lucrative salaries.

“This endowment enhances HSDM’s long legacy of training leaders in oral health research and academia,” said Bruce Donoff, dean of the Dental School. “Though HSDM is the smallest of the Harvard schools, it continues to have considerable influence on dental education and research within the broader oral health community.”

Grant Creates Center for Public Health and Medicine

The Association of American Medical Colleges and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have awarded HMS $50,000 over the next seven months to create a Regional Public Health–Medicine Education Center. The center will help integrate population health themes and skills into the School’s revised four year curriculum.

“It is critical that we recognize the health of individuals and populations as two ends of the same continuum,” said Jonathan Finkelstein, HMS associate professor in the Department of Ambulatory Care and Prevention and the center’s director. The center may apply for continued funding at the end of the initial grant period.

Honors and Advances

• Edward Velasco, a graduate student at HSPH, was named one of 10 Alexander von Humboldt Foundation German Chancellor scholars. The award funds a year of research in Germany for U.S. residents under the age of 35. Velasco will use the scholarship to study HIV/AIDS prevention programs for adolescents in Berlin.

• Ashaunta Tumblin, a third year medical student, has been selected to be one of four 2006 Lambaréné Schweitzer Fellows by the Albert Schweitzer Fellowship program. Fellows spend three months working as junior physicians at the Albert Schweitzer Hospital in Lambaréné, Gabon, which Schweitzer founded in 1913.

• In March, Sigmund Socransky, HSDM associate clinical professor of oral medicine, infection, and immunity at Forsyth Institute, was presented with the American Association for Dental Research’s Distinguished Scientist Award. The prize is the association’s highest honor, and is awarded for outstanding contributions to dental research.

• Elizabeth Rider, HMS assistant professor of pediatrics at Massachusetts General Hospital, was appointed director of programs for communication skills at MGH’s John D. Stoeckle Center for Primary Care Innovation. In this position she will direct educational programs in communication skills locally and nationally. Rider was also appointed course director for the Harvard Macy Institute Program to Enhance Relational and Communication Skills (PERCS) course.

• Harvey Goldman, HMS professor of pathology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, was presented with the 2006 Distinguished Pathologist Award from the United States and Canadian Academy of Pathology during a ceremony at the organization’s annual meeting in Atlanta. The award is given annually to an individual who has made long lasting contributions to the field of pathology.

• Brenda Bloodgood, a graduate student at HMS, and Ryan Phan, a research fellow in genetics, were two of sixteen students from North American and Asia chosen for a 2006 Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award sponsored by the Basic Sciences Division of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. The recipients will participate in a symposium in May, where they will present their research.

U.S. News & World Report Ranks HMS Number One

For the 16th consecutive year, U.S. News & World Report has rated HMS the nation’s top medical school in the research category, according to its recently released 2006 ranking of graduate schools.

Schools also were ranked by medical specialties. The Medical School placed first in pediatrics and women’s health. It came in second in the nation for internal medicine and third for drug and alchohol abuse and AIDS. And the School was ranked fourth in geriatrics.

Nominations Requested for Delores Brown Staff Award

The HMS Office of Human Resources is soliciting nominations for the Dolores J. Brown Award, which recognizes an exceptional staff assistant at HMS or HSDM. The $1,000 award was established to honor the memory of Dolores Brown, who was the assistant of former HMS dean Daniel Tosteson. Nominations are due by April 14 and should be submitted to Catherine Cisternelli at the Office of Human Resources, Gordon Hall, Room 010.

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