Brandeis Magazine

Brandeis awarded several important prizes over the past few months. The Lewis S. Rosenstiel Award for Distinguished Work in Basic Medical Research was given to Stephen C. Harrison, professor of basic medical sciences at Harvard Medical School, for his studies of protein structure using X-ray crystallography. The award will be given March 25, 2019, when Harrison delivers a public lecture. Lorenz Studer, developmental biologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, was presented the Jacob Heskel Gabbay Award in Biotechnology and Medicine. Studer harnesses the power of stem cells to advance our understanding of diseases; his research has led to a new treatment for Parkinson’s, expected to be tested soon in a human clinical trial. And Beverly Daniel Tatum received the Joseph B. and Toby Gittler Prize, which recognizes scholarly contributions to racial, ethnic or religious relations. A renowned authority on re-segregation and racial identity in America, Tatum is president emerita of Atlanta’s Spelman College.

The Heller School for Social Policy and Management named Monika Mitra the director of the Lurie Institute for Disability Policy. She had served as interim director since March 2017. The institute studies critical issues facing people with disabilities and their families, including poverty; unemployment; access to and quality of care; and other social, health and economic disparities.

Founding dean Peter Petri’s decades-long efforts in behalf of Brandeis International Business School have been recognized by the university’s establishment of the Peter A. Petri Chair in Business and Society. Ben Gomes-Casseres ’76, professor of international business, is the inaugural holder of the new chair.

A trio of coaches have been welcomed to the Brandeis campus. Jean Bain, formerly an associate head coach at Dartmouth and Columbia, is the new men’s basketball head coach. A 2002 graduate of Northeastern, Bain was named America East Rookie of the Year in 1999 and earned All-America East honors his senior year. Nicole Carter is the new head coach of men’s and women’s swimming and diving. For the past eight seasons, Carter has been an assistant coach at Wheaton College, where she is an alumna in the Class of 2002. And Jennie Salmon has been named the new men’s and women’s fencing head coach. Salmon has 22 years’ experience in club and high-school coaching, and in USA Fencing. She is a 1995 graduate of Temple, where she was a two-time foil All-American.

Avital Rodal, associate professor of biology, is one of six junior faculty members across the U.S. to receive the newly created Landis Award for Outstanding Mentorship, given by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (part of the National Institutes of Health). The award recognizes commitment to mentoring the next generation of scientists.

Stuart Altman, the Sol C. Chaikin Professor of National Health Policy at Heller, received the 2018 Gustav O. Lienhard Award for Advancement of Health Care from the National Academy of Medicine. The award spotlights outstanding achievement in improving personal health care in the U.S.