Cheers is a monthly listing of honors and awards received by faculty, staff and students plus recent appointments and promotions. Contributions must be submitted in writing and be accompanied by a phone number.

Arts and Sciences

Thomas Lectka, an associate professor of chemistry, is among 104 outstanding young scientists and economists selected to receive Sloan Research Fellowships. The fellowships are awarded to scientists in the early stages of their careers on the basis of their exceptional promise to contribute to the advancement of knowledge. Twenty-four former fellows have won Nobel Prizes.

Dana B. Harrar and Brian Bronzo, both juniors, have been awarded the 2000 Pfizer Undergraduate Summer Fellowship in Molecular Biology. The award is provided by the Pfizer Company to support summer research.

Medicine

Richard Ambinder has been named director of the Division of Hematologic Malignancies. Ambinder is an associate professor of oncology, pathology, and pharmacology and molecular sciences.

Curt Civin, director of Pediatric Oncology and King Fahd Professor of Oncology and Pediatrics, has been named editor in chief of the journal Stem Cell. Civin is the inventor of a stem cell selection process that has paved the way for more effective, less toxic cancer therapies.

John F. Dicello is one of six new members appointed for six-year terms to the 85-person National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements, a private organization chartered by Congress that develops and disseminates recommendations related to ionizing and non-ionizing radiation. Dicello is a professor of oncology and director of medical physics in the Division of Radiation Oncology, with a joint appointment in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences in the School of Public Health.

John Flynn, clinical director of the Division of General Internal Medicine, has received a Clinician Scholar Educator Award from the American College of Rheumatology. The peer-reviewed award, which provides $50,000 a year for three years, recognizes and supports rheumatologists dedicated to providing an exemplary educational experience. Flynn is an associate professor in the divisions of General Internal Medicine and Molecular and Clinical Rheumatology, and an assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences.

Gary B. Green, assistant professor of emergency medicine, has been awarded the Order of the International Federation for Emergency Medicine for his contributions to his field worldwide. Green is president of Emergency International Inc., a humanitarian organization he co-founded that has implemented emergency medicine development projects in more than a dozen countries. He also consults with the governments of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama and Cuba in emergency care and disaster preparedness.

Stuart Grossman has received the 2000 Farber Award, presented by the Anne and Jason Farber Foundation to a basic or clinical scientist who has made significant contributions to the field of neuro-oncology. Grossman, a professor of medicine, neurosurgery and oncology, also has been elected to a two-year term as president of the Society for Neuro-Oncology.

Patrick Jensen, an assistant professor of ophthalmology and co-director of the Wilmer Eye Institute's Microsurgery Advanced Design Lab, has been named one of the top 100 technology innovators under age 35 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Technology Review magazine. Jensen's work involves joining electromechanics, optics and software to extend the limits of a surgeon's perception and dexterity.

Laura Lee, an assistant professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation, has won the 1999 Association of Academic Physiatrists' Excellence in Research Writing Award for her paper published in the January/February 1999 issue of the American Journal of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation.

William T. Merritt, associate professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine, has been elected president of the International Liver Transplantation Society. Merritt is a founding member of the 800-member society, made up primarily of transplant hepatologists and surgeons.

Carl Moyer has been named director of the Fund for Johns Hopkins Medicine for Priority Projects. For the past two and a half years, Moyer has served as director of development for the Oncology Center. Taking over for Moyer in that position is Michael Morsberger, formerly senior associate director of development for the Oncology Center.

Harry Quigley, professor of ophthalmology and director of the Dana Center for Preventive Ophthalmology, has been awarded $125,000 from Research to Prevent Blindness to support the 2000-2001 Collaborative Training Program in Public Health Ophthalmology. The program enables foreign ophthalmologists to receive a year of training in the United States.

Harry Silber, an assistant professor of medicine, has received a Young Investigator's Award in Clinical Investigation from the American College of Cardiology for his presentation on magnetic resonance imaging studies of vascular properties.

Philip Smith, a professor of pulmonary medicine and director of the Sleep Disorders Center, has received a 1999 Distinguished Service Award from the American Lung Association in recognition of his fund-raising efforts to support local pulmonary research.

Peter Terry, a professor of pulmonary medicine, has received the 1999 George Willis Comstock Award from the American Lung Association of Maryland. Terry was honored for his contributions in the fight against lung disease and for his role as a longtime teacher of house staff and fellows.

Elizabeth Wagner, an associate professor of pulmonary medicine, has received a 1999 American Lung Association of Maryland Distinguished Service Award for her fund-raising efforts on behalf of local pulmonary research.

Gary Wand, a professor of medicine in the Division of Endocrinology and a professor of psychiatry, has received a $4.5 million, 10-year Merit Award from the National Institutes of Health to continue his research on the role of the brain's opioid system in alcoholism. NIH Merit Awards, similar to lifetime achievement awards, are reserved for senior investigators in recognition of their accomplishments. Over the last 15 years, Wand, a neurobiologist, has studied the effects of alcohol on animal opioid systems, compared the vulnerability to alcoholism in children of alcoholics and nonalcoholics, and conducted clinical trials of drugs that block opioid receptors.

Xian-Zhong Shawn Xu, a doctoral candidate, is among 17 graduate students selected to receive the Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award, newly established by the Basic Sciences Division of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.

Public Health

William Bishai, associate professor, Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, has been named by the Sequella Global Tuberculosis Foundation as one of 13 researchers in the Core Scientist Program of its Tuberculosis Vaccine Collaboration program.

Alan M. Goldberg, director, Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing, and professor, Environmental Health Sciences, is the new president of the In Vitro Specialty Section of the Society of Toxicology.

Lisa M. Hepburn, a doctoral candidate in Health Policy and Management, has been awarded one of 15 Woodrow Wilson- Johnson & Johnson Dissertation Grants in Children's Health for 2000. The topic of her dissertation will be "An evaluation of the impact of the 1988 Maryland law banning Saturday Night Special handguns on youth firearm-related violence."

Barry R. Zirkin, professor, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and head, Division of Reproductive Biology, has been elected president of the American Society of Andrology. Zirkin's research includes regulation of Leydig cell aging, hormonal regulation of spermatogenesis, germ cell proliferation and apoptosis, endocrine and molecular basis of male fertility and infertility, and the effect of environmental toxicants on the male reproductive tract.

Joanne Zurlo, associate director, Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing, and research associate, Environmental Health Sciences, has been appointed chair of the Animal Resources Information Committee of the Institute of Laboratory Research Council at the National Academy of Sciences.