Strategic Communications and Marketing News Bureau

Achievements

 IN THIS ISSUE: ADMINISTRATION | ACES | FAA | LAS |

administration

Joseph Smith, a retired UI administrator, was honored by the Episcopal Seminary of the Southwest on the occasion of his retirement from the seminary board after nine years of service. Smith was an active member of the board’s faculty and education committee. Smith, who began his career at the UI in 1964, was a professor of English and held various administrative appointments, retiring as professor emeritus and director of academic affirmative action in 1994.

agricultural, consumer and environmental sciences

Janice Bahr, a professor of physiology in the department of animal sciences, is the first recipient of the Trainee Mentoring Award give by the Society for the Study of Reproduction, an international scientific society. The award was presented recently at the society’s annual meeting in San Antonio. The award was established by trainees who are graduate students and postdoctoral fellows to recognize outstanding mentoring. “Dr. Bahr has been committed to mentoring young scientists, providing leadership to the community, and support to those she has come in contact with throughout her career,” the selection committee noted. “Through her actions and efforts she has positively impacted many students in the field of reproduction and enhanced their personal and professional lives.”

Schuyler S. Korban, a professor of molecular genetics and biotechnology, received the 2007 Outstanding International Horticulturist Award from the American Society for Horticultural Science. The award was presented in July at the society’s meetings in Scottsdale, Ariz. Korban was recognized for his pioneering accomplishments in plant molecular genetics and genomics, and his unique capacity to engage in research that both pushes the frontiers of scientific understanding while providing practical outcomes. Korban’s leadership role in the global arena – demonstrated by his numerous scientific publications and collaborations with scientists from Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Germany, Mexico and New Zealand – also were noted.

fine and applied arts

A recent animated film by Gerald Guthrie, professor of art, will be screened in three upcoming film festivals during September. His animated film, “The Power of Suggestion” (2006), will be shown twice at the Charlotte Film Festival, Charlotte, N.C.; three times at the New Jersey Film Festival at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N.J.; and at the 21st Edmonton International Film Festival, Edmonton, Canada.

liberal arts and sciences

John F. Hartwig, the Kenneth L. Rinehart Endowed Chair of Chemistry, will receive the 2008 Paul N. Rylander Award from the Organic Reactions Catalysis Society. Hartwig will give Rylander Award presentations at the society’s spring conference in Richmond, Va.

Paul Hergenrother, a professor of chemistry, will receive the 2008 Eli Lilly Award in Biological Chemistry. The award will be presented at the national meeting of the American Chemical Society in Philadelphia in August 2008. The award recognizes Hergenrother’s “application of chemical principles to the study of cellular processes in developing promising new approaches to arresting cancer and to treating bacterial diseases.”

Lillian Hoddeson has been named the first Thomas Siebel Chair in the History of Science at the UI.

Hoddeson, a professor of history at Illinois since 1989, as well as a research physicist, an affiliate of the Beckman Institute, and a Campus Honors Program professor, holds a doctorate in physics. She has had “a long and distinguished career as a historian of science with commitments to rigorous academic research and to the translation of that work into more popular forms and forums,” said Antoinette Burton, the chair of the history department.

“Lillian is internationally known and well respected not only among historians of science but also among physicists, a rare accomplishment in the field,” Burton said. “Her global reputation has been linked to historicizing the production of scientific knowledge at Illinois and in the state more generally.”

Siebel, who earned four degrees at Illinois, made the new chair possible with a $2 million endowment. Hoddeson was chosen by a committee of her peers.

Ralph Nuzzo, the Lycan Professor of Chemistry, has been named a fellow of the American Vacuum Society. The fellowship recognizes members who have made sustained and outstanding scientific contributions in the areas of interest to the organization. Nuzzo was cited “for discovery, characterization and development of self-assembled monolayers, materials that have revolutionized surface science by extending it to organic and biological materials, atmospheric pressure and contact with water.”

Stephen G. Sligar, a professor of biophysics in the School of Molecular and Cellular Biology and a professor at the Beckman Institute, was named a fellow of the Biophysical Society for his work in advancing knowledge of biological function through the concerted application of numerous biophysical methods. Sligar will be honored at the society’s annual meeting in Long Beach, Calif., in February.

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