Four from HMS Join NAS

The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) has named 72 new members, four of whom are HMS faculty members. The NAS is a private organization of scientists and engineers dedicated to the progress of science. New members are chosen in recognition of their achievements in original research.

The new NAS members from HMS are Michael Greenberg, Ronald Kessler, Anjana Rao, and Gary Ruvkun.

The Greenberg laboratory has identified a genetic program by which experience promotes the development and maturation of synapses in the brain. An HMS professor of neurology at Children’s Hospital Boston, Greenberg and his colleagues are currently investigating the mechanisms of signaling from the synapse to the nucleus that leads to gene activation and how components of the experience-dependent gene program shape synaptic development.

Kessler, HMS professor of health care policy, is a sociologist whose research deals broadly with the structural determinants and social consequences of mental disorders. He is director of the World Health Organization World Mental Health Survey Initiative, where he supervises implementation and analysis of psychiatric epidemiological surveys in 28 countries throughout the world.

Rao’s research has been focused on the molecular mechanisms of signal transduction and gene expression in T cells and other immune cells. Specifically, she has elucidated the intracellular signal transduction pathway leading from store-operated calcium entry through CRAC channels to activation of the transcription factor NFAT. Rao, HMS professor of pathology at the Immune Disease Institute, identified the founding member of the NFAT family and the CRAC channel pore subunit and defined the dual roles of the calcium/NFAT pathway in immune activation and tolerance.

Ruvkun, HMS professor of genetics at Massachusetts General Hospital, played a role in the discovery of microRNA. The Ruvkun lab also investigates longevity and fat storage. He and his colleagues discovered that like mammals, C. elegans uses an insulin-signaling pathway to control its metabolism and longevity, and they showed that insulin signaling in the nervous system is key to life span. Currently, his lab is investigating how approximately 100 other gene inactivations cause an increase in life span in C. elegans.

Arts and Sciences Academy Names Med School Members

Seven HMS faculty members were elected as American Academy of Arts and Sciences fellows for 2008, out of a total of 212. They are Rakesh Jain, the A. Werk Cook professor of radiation oncology (tumor biology) at Massachusetts General Hospital; Kevin Struhl, the David Wesley Gaiser professor of biological chemistry and molecular pharmacology at HMS; Timothy Mitchison, the Hasib Sabbagh professor of systems biology at HMS; Norbert Perrimon, HMS professor of genetics; Judy Lieberman, HMS professor of pediatrics at Children’s Hospital Boston and the Immune Disease Institute; Leonard Zon, the Grousbeck professor of pediatrics at Children’s; and Jerome Groopman, the Dina and Raphael Recanati professor of medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. The new fellows will be inducted in October at the academy’s Cambridge headquarters.

Professorship Announced in Hearing Research

A reception was held at Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary on April 14 to celebrate the appointment of M. Charles Liberman (far right) as the first incumbent of the Harold F. Schuknecht Professorship of Otology and Laryngology. Chair of otology and laryngology at HMS from 1961 to 1987 and chief of otology at MEEI from 1961 to 1984, Schuknecht was an early innovator in otology and enhanced MEEI’s reputation as a world leader in otology research. Liberman is the director of the Eaton–Peabody Laboratory (EPL) at the hospital.

Tanit Sakakini

Joseph Nadol Jr. (above left), chief of otolaryngology at MEEI and chairman of the Department of Otolaryngology at HMS, emceed the program, and Jeffrey Flier, dean of the Faculty of Medicine, was the special guest. Flier emphasized the importance of endowed chairs, saying they “enable growth within a department, provide an important means of recognition for outstanding researchers like Dr. Liberman, and aid in the teaching partnership between HMS and MEEI.” Flier presented Anne Schuknecht (above center), the widow of Harold Schuknecht, with the traditional HMS Revere bowl.

Nelson Kiang, director emeritus of the EPL, also gave remarks because he knew both Schuknecht and Liberman in their “formative years” and throughout their careers. He said that although the two doctors never met face to face, they did, indeed, share a common spirit since they were both “seekers of the truth.”
Liberman expressed his gratitude for the honor of being the chair’s first incumbent. He described his career at the EPL, which started when he was an undergraduate at Harvard. He said the staff was made up of “great minds with ordinary egos,” which, he quipped, is fairly rare in either academic or medical settings, let alone at an institution that combines the two.

News Brief

Three HMS students and a fellow recently received awards from the Massachusetts Medical Society. David Kaelber, who is a research fellow in medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, a research fellow in health sciences and technology, and a National Library of Medicine medical informatics fellow at the Center for Information Technology Leadership (a part of Partners HealthCare), and Shannon Wieland, a third-year HMS student, each won Information Technology Awards for developing technology tools that enhance clinical practice, clinical research, or medical education. Melissa Burroughs and Jennifer Levy, both fourth-year HMS students, were named Massachusetts Medical Society Scholars. Scholars are selected based on academic performance, community involvement, and financial need.

Diversity Awards Deadline Extended
The deadline to submit nominations for the 2008 Harold Amos Faculty Diversity Award and the Sharon P. Clayborne Staff Diversity Award has been extended to May 30. Instructions and an online nomination form can be found at www.mfdp.med.harvard.edu/awards/index.htm. For more information, contact Nancy Kaufman at nancy_kaufman@hms.harvard.edu or 617-432-1037.

Foundations Relocate

The Giovanni Armenise–Harvard Foundation and the Dubai Harvard Foundation for Medical Research both have relocated to Landmark Center, 401 Park Drive, Suite 22 West. The Armenise foundation can be reached at 617-998-8858 or cheryl_king@hms.harvard.edu. The Dubai Harvard Foundation can be reached at 617-998-8859 or online at www.dhfmr.hms.harvard.edu.

In Memoriam

Jean Jackson, HMS instructor in medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, died on Jan. 31. Jackson received her BS in 1963 from the University of Rhode Island and her MD in 1967 from the University of Maryland Medical School, where she was one of only five females in her class. She also completed her medical residency there. As a medical student, she was influenced by Betty Stevens at Johns Hopkins, who was a major force in rheumatology.

Jackson joined the HMS community in 1970 as research fellow in rheumatology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. She returned to Maryland to serve as chief medical resident and remained as director of clinical rheumatology. In 1975, she was recruited back to BWH to become the first female staff rheumatologist, specializing in both pediatric and adult rheumatology.

Jackson was known for her dedication to patients and for her energy and skill at bedside teaching. She was recognized for her contributions as a clinician-educator with several awards, including the Arthritis Foundation’s Marian Ropes Physician Achievement Award in 2005 and the BWH Lifetime Achievement Award in Medical Education in 2006. To honor her teaching legacy, the BWH Department of Medicine will inaugurate the Jean M. Jackson Distinguished Bedside Teacher Award, which will be offered for the first time at the end of this academic year.

Jackson is survived by her mother, Irja; brother, John; sister-in-law, Debbie; niece, Melanie; nephews, Lyle and John; and godchild, Joshua Davis.

Thomas Carlyle (Carl) Jones, HMS professor emeritus of comparative pathology, passed away on Dec. 9, 2007. He was 95.

Jones re-ceived a DVM from Washington State University in 1935. After graduation, he entered the Veterinary Corps of the U.S. Army upon the advice and encouragement of its chief, General Raymond Kelser. He was eventually placed in charge of the U.S. Army Veterinary Research Laboratory. In 1947, he became the chief of Veterinary Pathology at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Washington, D.C.; this administrative post was interrupted by an assignment oversees as chief of the Veterinary Department of the Fourth Field Laboratory in Germany. Over this 10-year period, he developed a broad and extensive knowledge of comparative pathology, which led to co-authorship with H.A. Smith of the now-classic 1957 textbook, Veterinary Pathology.

Upon retirement from the Army, Jones came to Boston in 1957 as a pathologist at Angell Memorial Hospital, where he began collaborating with the Pathology Department at HMS. He joined the HMS community in 1957, serving as clinical associate in pathology from 1957 to 1963, associate clinical professor of pathology from 1963 to 1971, professor of comparative pathology from 1971 to 1982, and professor emeritus of comparative pathology from 1982 to 2007. Jones worked at the New England Primate Research Center (NEPRC) beginning in 1967, serving as associate director for collaborative research until 1979. He remained active in NEPRC and the Department of Pathology programs also as an emeritus professor.

Jones helped to develop HMS programs directed at better understanding diseases of non-human primates and their effectiveness as models for human disease. He also served on many committees and editorial boards, including as president of the International Academy of Pathology in 1971 and associate editor of Pathologica Veterinaria from 1964 to 1971.

Jones was predeceased by his wife of 52 years, Dorotha Anne (Bratt) Jones, in 1987. He is survived by two daughters, Sylvia Garfield and Anne Jones Willis; a son, Don Carl Jones; his companion Joyce Blalock; and eight grandchildren. Services were held in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he had lived since 1996.

top