October 17, 2007 edition

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Faculty/Staff News & Notes

Faculty Mentoring Award nominations due Jan. 18
Distinguished faculty lauded at Oct. 2 gathering
Postdocs honored with research excellence awards
Decorations & Distinctions

Faculty Mentoring Award nominations due Jan. 18

Nominations for the Faculty Mentoring Award, sponsored by the Carolina Women’s Leadership Council, are due Jan. 18, 2008. Each winner will receive $5,000.

The awards will honor faculty-to-student mentoring and faculty-to-faculty mentoring, with one award given in each category.

All tenured and tenure-track faculty as well as fixed-term faculty who have taught at Carolina for at least three years are eligible for the award. Visiting faculty are not eligible. Nominations are accepted from current and former faculty, staff and students.

Nominators should provide three separate attachments using Microsoft Word:

  Brief (one-paragraph) statement of rationale for nomination;

  Narrative description (not to exceed two pages) of the extent, type and character of the mentoring provided by the nominee; and

  Nominee’s curriculum vitae.

Nominations should be submitted electronically at www.unc.edu/pcgi-bin/WLCMA_viewapp.pl.

Winners will be selected in mid-February, with awards presented at the Feb. 28-29, 2008, meeting of the Carolina Women’s Leadership Council.

Part of the Carolina First Campaign volunteer leadership structure, the 130-member Women’s Leadership Council is a network of women from across the country who are committed to supporting the University and students’ educational experiences. Along with providing financial support, members volunteer their time and share their expertise, as well as champion Carolina in their regions and serve on boards that further the University’s mission. The council is co-chaired by alumni Mary Anne Dickson, Barbara Hyde and Julia Sprunt Grumbles.

Distinguished faculty lauded at Oct. 2 gathering

Chancellor James Moeser and Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Bernadette Gray-Little hosted a luncheon Oct. 2 to recognize faculty members who have received significant professional recognition or honors since 2005. The 2007 Distinguished Faculty Awards Luncheon was the first of what is intended to become an annual tradition.

Faculty members recognized for this event, for example, had been elected to a prestigious national honorary society, received presidential appointment to a national governing or advisory body, received distinguished awards from major national or international organizations or governments or won prestigious national research awards requiring nomination by the University.

More than 75 faculty members from across the campus were included. They received a Research Distinction lapel pin with the symbol of the Old Well to acknowledge their research achievements at UNC.

In his welcoming remarks Moeser set the tone for the event: “Our vision of Carolina as the leading public university in America depends in large part on the strength and vitality of our faculty.

“On behalf of the Carolina community, thank you for the tremendous contribution you are making on this campus, in North Carolina, and the world.”

To see a complete list of the faculty members honored with the special recognitions they have received for their research efforts, see research.unc.edu/red/distinguished_faculty_luncheon_2007.pdf.

Postdocs honored with research excellence awards

On Sept. 25, the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs hosted the 2007 Postdoctoral Scholars Awards for Research Excellence at the Carolina Inn. This was the first year for the awards ceremony, although the awards were first presented in 2004. The keynote address was given by Jeff Dangl, the John N. Couch Distinguished Professor of Biology and newly elected member of the National Academy of Sciences. Awards were presented by Douglas Cyr, chair of the Faculty Advisory Committee on Postdoctoral Scholars, and Tony Waldrop, vice chancellor for research and economic development.

The awards are given in recognition of the research promise demonstrated by individual postdoctoral scholars. They are open to postdoctoral scholars in all disciplines and are designed to assist postdoctoral scholars in their continued professional development by supporting the recipients in conference travel, purchasing books, lab materials or engaging in other scholarly activities that directly enhance the individual’s professional growth.  Each of the 10 recipients received a plaque and a monetary award of $1000.

Recipients were:

  James Patrick Cronin, a postdoctoral research associate in biological sciences, who is an experimental ecologist studying the impacts of global changes on infectious disease dynamics;

  Mathew Dupre, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Carolina Population Center, whose research offers various ways of linking longitudinal data sets that are focused on different parts of the life span;

  Matthew Frieman, who joined the lab of epidemiologist Ralph Baric to work on pathogenesis, but now focuses on the respiratory pathogen, the SARS Coronavirus;

  Hegui Gong, who does his postdoctoral research with Michel R. Gagné, professor of chemistry. Of Gong’s eight publications, three are in the Journal of the American Chemical Society and one is in the Angewette Chemie International Edition;

  Laura Halperin, a postdoctoral fellow in the Carolina Postdoctoral Program for Faculty Diversity who works under the mentorship of María DeGuzmán to help build Latina/o Studies;

  Heidi M. Mansour, who is a postdoctoral pharmaceutical research scholar, working on the characterization, systematic design and development of pulmonary inhalation aerosol delivery systems for targeted lung delivery and for novel needle-free vaccine delivery as microparticles and nanoparticles.

  Dan Marston, a postdoctoral fellow with Bob Goldstein, associate professor of biology, studying the regulation of gastrulation movements in C. elegans. His investigations focus on the cell movements and shape changes which drive morphogenesis during development;

  oanna Poblete-Cross, a postdoctoral fellow in the history department, whose research focuses on issues of the United States empire and the impact of government structures and policies on the everyday lives of United States colonials, such as Filipinos, Puerto Ricans and Samoans;

  Rachael Rigby, whose research focuses on inflammatory bowel disease and Crohns’ disease, particularly how the disease affects the epithelial lining of the intestine and its risk of inappropriate cell division leading to cancer; and

  Leslie Sombers, a postdoctoral research associate in chemistry, work in the lab of R. Mark Wightman studying the effects of addictive drugs on brain chemistry, particularly on the mesolimbic dopamine system.

For more information, e-mail sibby@email.unc.edu or call 962-9982.

Decorations & Distinctions

Michael Chitwood
Lecturer in the Creative Writing Program, Chitwood will be the featured author at Emory and Henry College’s 26th Annual Literary Festival in Emory, Va., Oct. 18-19. The Emory & Henry alumnus will read from his work at 7:30 p.m. on Oct. 18. On Oct. 19, at 3:30 p.m., he will participate in a public conversation conducted by Michael McFee, professor in the Creative Writing Program.

Sherryl Kleinman
Professor of sociology, Kleinman was presented with the Carolina Women’s Center 2007 Women’s Advocacy Award at the center’s 10th anniversary keynote lecture on Sept. 25.

Kleinman was selected for her “support of women’s rights and justice at UNC for the last 27 years,” her “supportive and student-driven approach” to teaching, advocacy and analysis and her “efforts to advocate for gender equity on the Carolina campus.”

Carlton C. Hunt
James W. Jorgenson
Terry Magnuson
James C. Moeser
Michael E. Taylor

Hunt, professor of physiology; Jorgenson, W.R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Chemistry; Magnuson, Sarah Graham Professor and chair of genetics and director of the Carolina Center for Genome Sciences; Moeser, Carolina’s chancellor; and Taylor, William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Mathematics, were inducted into the 227th class of fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences at an Oct. 6 ceremony at Harvard University.

Founded in 1780, the academy honors excellence each year by electing to membership the finest minds and most influential leaders of the day. Among this year’s new members are Albert Gore Jr., former vice president; Sandra Day O’Connor, U.S. Supreme Court associate justice; Michael Bloomberg, mayor of New York City; Eric Schmidt, chair and chief executive officer of Google; James Risen, New York Times investigative correspondent; Spike Lee, filmmaker; Alice Waters, chef, activist and cookbook author; and John Lasseter, Pixar chief creative officer.