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Kudos

Recognition for Dartmouth faculty, staff, and students
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Ayah M. Ahmed '10

Ayah M. Ahmed '10, a biology major and Arabic minor, was invited by the World Health Organization (WHO) to present her study "Prevention of Cardiovascular Diseases through Active Community Participation in Egypt" this March in Geneva, Switzerland. The study is based on research she conducted in Nag Al-Arab, Egypt, and will be published with the WHO's Community-Based Initiatives. Denise Anthony, associate professor and chair in the Department of Sociology, assisted Ahmed with the review of the study and data analyses of the results.  Ahmed says, "My deep interest in class-based health differentials and the provision of health care in under-resourced communities of Africa inspired me to propose this study to the WHO's Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office in Cairo."

Peter Belenky, a Ph.D. candidate in molecular and cellular biology in the Department of Biochemistry at Dartmouth Medical School, has won a 2009 Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award, one of 13 graduate students from North America to be so honored. He will present at the 10th annual Weintraub Award Symposium at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle on May 1. Belenky, a member of Professor of Genetics and Biochemistry Charles Brenner's lab at Norris Cotton Cancer Center, is the first Dartmouth student to receive this award.

Joyce DeLeo

Dartmouth Medical School pain scientist Joyce DeLeo has won the American Pain Society's 2009 Frederick W. L. Kerr Basic Science Research Award. The Irene Heinz Given Professor of Pharmacology and chair of the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, DeLeo is recognized for her outstanding contributions to the field of pain. She studies nervous system (glia) and immune cells and how their functions may be modulated to develop new targets for drug therapy to treat acute and chronic pain. She will be honored May 7 at the society's annual scientific meeting in San Diego, Calif.

Sergei Kan

Sergei Kan, professor of anthropology and Native American studies, delivered the keynote address at the Alaska Anthropological Association's annual meeting in Juneau on March 13. Kan has conducted anthropological research among the Tlingits of southeastern Alaska since 1979, focusing on two major topics: the memorial potlatch (a ritual celebration of the ancestors) and its historical transformation, and the incorporation of Christianity into Tlingit culture. Kan's presentation, "Researching Tlingit History and Culture: A Thirty-Year Retrospective," described the changes in his own research as well as changes in the relationship between anthropologists and Native Alaskans in the past 30 years. He emphasized that collaborative research has become common and that an increasing number of present-day anthropological projects have direct benefits for Native communities. He also noted that the number of Native Alaskans pursuing undergraduate and graduate degrees in anthropology has increased, making a major difference for the anthropology of the 49th state.

Margaret Lawrence

The National Dance Project (NDP), a program of New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA), has named Margaret Lawrence, director of programming at the Hopkins Center, an NDP Hub Site representative for 2009-2012. Representatives are selected for their extensive knowledge of the dance field and demonstrated leadership in developing new dance work. As a Hub Site representative, Lawrence will review proposals, make funding recommendations, and guide program policy on behalf of the National Dance Project as it provides a national system of support for contemporary dance.

Dartmouth's William H. Neukom Institute for Computational Science has awarded three faculty CompX Grants. The program funds the development of novel computational techniques as well as the application of computational methods to problems in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities. Awards are up to $20,000 for one-year projects. This year's recipients are Assistant Professor of Computer Science Chris Bailey-Kellogg and Assistant Professor of Engineering Karl Griswold for "Integrating Computation and Experiment in Functional Deimmunization of Therapeutic Protein"; Research Associate Professor of Computer Science Lorie Loeb for "Green Lite Dartmouth"; and Assistant Professor of Engineering Reza Olfati-Saber for "Cyber-Physical Networked Systems Tested."

Joseph O'Donnell

Joseph O'Donnell, professor of medicine and psychiatry at Dartmouth Medical School (DMS), received a $25,000 grant from the Harvard Pilgrim Healthcare Foundation to support DMS's Urban Health Scholars Program. Founded by two DMS students three years ago, the program trains medical students to better understand the cultural, linguistic, and socioeconomic factors that affect underserved patients in urban areas. Currently 17 DMS students are in the program, which serves populations in Boston, Mass., and Manchester, N.H. O'Donnell advises the program along with Shawn O'Leary, director of multicultural affairs at DMS. Learn more at http://dms2.dartmouth.edu/uhs.

William Summers, associate professor of music, has won the Norman Neuerburg Award given by the Historical Society of Southern California for outstanding writing in early California history. The award recognizes the book Juan Bautista Sancho: Pioneer Composer of California (Palma de Mallorca, University of the Balearic Islands Press, 2007), which Summers co-authored. Written in three languages (Spanish, Catalan, and English), the volume also includes a CD-ROM containing recorded performances and newly edited scores of the music of the Spanish-born Sancho, who settled in Mission San Antonio de Padua in 1804.

 

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