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Resource Brief

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Science Advances

News from NCRR

People, Awards, Grants, and New Developments

Five Members Appointed to NCRR Advisory Council

The National Advisory Research Resources Council advises NCRR on policies and programs and performs second-level peer review of grant applications. Five distinguished researchers and health administrators were recently appointed as new council members.

Nancy J. Brown, Robert H. Williams Professor of medicine and pharmacology and associate dean for clinical and translational scientist development in the School of Medicine, Vanderbilt University. Brown is nationally known for her research on blood pressure regulation. She is a founder and former director of the Master of Science in Clinical Investigation program and was recently recognized for her commitment to promoting research among young physicians.

Valerie Copie, associate professor of biochemistry at Montana State University. Copie’s investigations focus on the connection between a protein’s three-dimensional architecture and its biological function(s), the mechanism by which atomic structures and internal dynamics modulate biochemical activity, and the significance of conserved amino acid residues in protein families. Her approach involves multidimensional, heteronuclear, solution nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy along with complementary biophysical techniques.

Henry Lewis, III, professor and director of research programs in the College of Pharmacy at Florida A&M University (FAMU). Lewis has previously served as dean of the College of Pharmacy at both FAMU and Texas Southern University and was interim president of FAMU. He also has been on the national advisory council of the National Institute of General Medical Sciences and was an NIH extramural associate. Lewis is currently the principal investigator for the Research Centers in Minority Institutions at FAMU. His area of research is sickle cell anemia.

Mark V. Pauly, Bendheim Professor of health care systems, business and public policy, and insurance and risk management, Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and professor of economics, College of Arts and Sciences. Pauly was a commissioner on the Physician Payment Review Commission and is an active member of the Institute of Medicine. He was previously on the faculty of Northwestern University. Pauly has studied how health insurance coverage affects the use of various types of medical services and has been investigating ways to reduce the number of uninsured through tax credits and the appropriate design for Medicare in a budget-constrained environment.

Janet L. Smith, Margaret J. Hunter Collegiate Professor of life sciences and professor of biological chemistry at the University of Michigan. Smith’s research focuses on understanding biological processes by determining the structures of key proteins. In particular, her work examines the structures of proteins from infectious pathogens, including the RNA viruses that cause West Nile, yellow fever, and dengue, and those involved in biosynthetic pathways for the polyketide family of secondary metabolites.