Abbreviated Edited by Ann Stiller
Four cross-disciplinary scholars have joined the ranks of Bloomberg Distinguished Professors. Arturo Casadevall, a microbiologist and immunologist, has appointments in the Bloomberg School of Public Health and the School of Medicine. Physician scientist and biomedical informatician Christopher Chute joins the faculty of the schools of Medicine, Nursing, and Public Health. Computational biologist Steven Salzberg has appointments in the schools of Medicine, Engineering, and Public Health. Alexander Szalay, an astrophysicist and computer scientist, is on the faculties of the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and the Whiting School of Engineering.
Kay Redfield Jamison, a psychiatry professor in the School of Medicine and a leading authority on bipolar illness, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is among 197 new members, who include novelist Tom Wolfe, Pulitzer Prize winner Holland Cotter, and Nike co-founder Philip Knight. Her election brings to 52 the number of current Hopkins faculty who are members of AAAS.
Aravinda Chakravarti, a professor of medicine, pediatrics, molecular biology and genetics, and biostatistics in the schools of Medicine and Public Health, and Donald Geman, a professor of applied mathematics and statistics in the Whiting School, have been elected to the National Academy of Sciences. They are among 84 new members of the honorary society elected in April.
Peabody faculty artist John Walker presented master classes and lectures at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music in May, marking the first occasion that an American organist has taught there. In addition to representing Peabody, Walker went to Shanghai as national president of the American Guild of Organists.
Stamatios "Tom" Krimigis, head emeritus of the Space Department at the Applied Physics Laboratory, received the 2015 Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Trophy for Lifetime Achievement, the museum's highest honor. Established in 1985, the award recognizes outstanding achievements in the fields of aerospace science and technology and their history.
Sahar Soleimanifard is one of 30 recipients of the Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans, the premier graduate fellowship for immigrants to America. She completed a PhD at the Whiting School and is now working toward her MD at the School of Medicine.
Two Krieger School professors— Lawrence Principe, in History of Science and Technology, and Niloofar Haeri, chair of Anthropology—are among the 175 recipients of Guggenheim Fellowships awarded this year. Guggenheim Fellows are appointed on the basis of impressive achievement in the past and exceptional promise for future accomplishment.
Quenton Bubb, a junior biophysics major in the Krieger School, has won a UNCF/Merck Undergraduate Science Research Award, given annually to 15 college juniors. Sponsored by the United Negro College Fund and Merck & Co., the scholarships aim to increase the number of minority students preparing for careers in science and engineering. Bubb plans to pursue medical and doctoral degrees in molecular biophysics.
Alfred Sommer, a University Distinguished Service Professor and former dean of the Bloomberg School of Public Health, was named the inaugural recipient of the Welch-Rose Award for Distinguished Service to Academic Public Health, established by the Association of Schools & Programs of Public Health.
Jeanne Alhusen, an assistant professor in Community-Public Health in the School of Nursing, received the Southern Nursing Research Society's Early Science Investigator Award. Her research focuses on the biological and psychological foundations of maternal attachments and their impact on childhood outcomes.
Cardiothoracic and heart-lung transplant surgeon Robert S.D. Higgins was appointed the new surgeon-in-chief of Johns Hopkins Medicine, the William Stewart Halsted Professor of Surgery, and director of the Department of Surgery at the School of Medicine. Higgins, previously at the Ohio State University, joins Johns Hopkins on July 1.
Eric Puchner, an assistant professor in the Writing Seminars, has won the 2015 Jeannette Haien Ballard Writer's Prize, a $25,000 annual award given to "a young writer of proven excellence in poetry or prose." Puchner's first novel, Model Home, was published in 2010 by Scribner.
Samuel M. Alaish, pediatric surgeon and associate professor in the School of Medicine, has joined the Johns Hopkins Children's Center to co-lead its newly formed Center for Intestinal Rehab and Cure Using Science. The center is dedicated to the study and care of children with short bowel syndrome.
James Guest, an associate professor in the Department of Civil Engineering, is the recipient of the American Society of Civil Engineers' 2015 EMI Leonardo da Vinci Award. This award recognizes a young investigator whose contributions have the promise to define new directions in the theory and application of engineering mechanics.
In the U.S. News & World Report "Best Graduate Schools" rankings published in March, the Bloomberg School of Public Health remained in the No. 1 spot for the 21st consecutive year, and the School of Education held No. 1 for the second year. Biomedical Engineering, a joint program of the schools of Engineering and Medicine, was also ranked first in the nation. The School of Nursing's master's degree programs tied for second, and the School of Medicine tied for third. The Whiting School of Engineering jumped two spots to a tie at 25th place.
K.T. Ramesh, a professor in Mechanical Engineering and director of the Hopkins Extreme Materials Institute, received the Society for Experimental Mechanics' W.M. Murray Medal, SEM's highest honor. He was selected for this recognition for his "major impact on our understanding of nanomaterials and dynamic failure processes."
Chia-Ling Chien, a professor of physics in the Krieger School, has been awarded the 2015 IUPAP Magnetism Award and Néel Medal, given every three years to a scientist who has made extraordinary contributions to the field of magnetism. It is the highest honor bestowed by the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics Commission on Magnetism.
SOURCE, a community outreach center for Johns Hopkins in East Baltimore, celebrated its 10th anniversary in April with an event at Living Classrooms Foundation in Federal Hill. The Student Outreach Resource Center oversees 100 partnerships with community-based organizations whose interests range from health care and housing to the environment and refugees.
