NIDDK Welcomes Seven New Members to Advisory
Council
Secretary of Health and Human Services Michael O. Leavitt has
appointed seven new members to the Advisory Council of the National
Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK),
the Institute announced today. NIDDK is part of the National Institutes
of Health (NIH) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
The NIH is the federal agency with primary responsibility for funding
and conducting biomedical research within the United States.
Established by law and charter, the NIDDK Advisory Council meets
three times annually to advise the NIDDK about its research portfolio.
The Council typically undertakes broad issues of science policy.
Members of the Advisory Council are drawn from the scientific and
lay communities, are appointed for four-year terms, and represent
all areas within the Institute’s research mission. An important
role of the Council is to provide second-level peer review of grant
applications that have been scored by scientific review groups.
The Council members are an important liaison between the research
communities they represent and the NIDDK, which supports each community’s
research efforts.
NIDDK Acting Director, Griffin P. Rodgers, M.D., M.A.C.P., will
chair the Advisory Council meeting on February 21 which the following
new members will attend:
Charles O. Elson, III, M.D., is Vice Chair for
Research in the Department of Medicine and the Basil I. Hirschowitz
Chair in Gastroenterology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Dr. Elson’s research interests include the regulation of mucosal
immune responses in the digestive tract. This research has implications
for the understanding and treatment of inflammatory bowel disease,
colitis, and Crohn’s disease. Dr. Elson joins the Digestive Diseases
and Nutrition (DDN) Subcommittee.
James W. Freston, M.D., Ph.D., is the Boehringer
Ingelheim Chair of Clinical Pharmacology and Professor Emeritus
at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine in Farmington.
Dr. Freston’s research interests include the clinical pharmacology
of digestive diseases, including acid-related disorders and drug-induced
liver injury. He is a member of the NIDDK-funded National Drug-Induced
Liver Injury Network (DILIN). Dr. Freston joins the Digestive Diseases
and Nutrition (DDN) Subcommittee.
Mark A. Magnuson, M.D., is the Earl W. Sutherland,
Jr., Professor of Molecular Physiology and Biophysics and Director
of the Center for Stem Cell Biology at the Vanderbilt University
School of Medicine in Nashville, Tennessee. His research interests
include the pathophysiology of type 2 diabetes mellitus, pancreatic
beta cell function and development, the use of site-specific recombinases
in mice, and directed differentiation of embryonic stem cells.
Dr. Magnuson joins the Diabetes, Endocrinology, and Metabolic Diseases
(DEM) Subcommittee.
William E. Mitch, M.D., is the Gordon A. Cain
Professor of Medicine and Director of the Division of Nephrology
at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. His research interests
include the study of metabolic abnormalities associated with kidney
disease and the mechanism controlling the loss of muscle mass.
His clinical interests include treatment of patients with chronic
renal disease and methods for delaying loss of kidney function.
Dr. Mitch joins the Kidney, Urologic, and Hematologic Diseases
(KUH) Subcommittee.
Lisa H. Richardson has been a volunteer with
the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation of America, Inc. (CCFA) since
1989. The CCFA National Foundation is headquartered in New York
City with the mission to cure and prevent Crohn’s disease and ulcerative
colitis through research, and to improve the quality of life of
children and adults affected by these diseases through education
and support. Ms. Richardson has chaired and served on numerous
committees for the Houston Gulf Coast/South Texas Chapter of CCFA,
as well as committees for CCFA’s National Board of Trustees, two
of which include the Education Advisory Committee and the Research
Advisory Committees. She currently serves CCFA as National Emeritus
Chairperson of the Board. Ms. Richardson joins the Digestive Diseases
and Nutrition (DDN) Subcommittee.
Anthony J. Schaeffer, M.D., is the Herman L.
Kretschmer Professor and Chairman of the Department of Urology
at Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University in Chicago,
Illinois. Dr. Schaeffer is a leader in the study of urinary tract
infections and prostatitis. He is currently Chair of the National
Institutes of Health Multi-Site Collaborative Research Project
on male chronic pelvic pain syndrome (prostatitis). He is also
currently Chair of the Research Council for the American Urological
Association. In 1996 he was awarded a National Institutes of Health
Merit Award grant from the NIDDK for research on urinary tract
infections. Dr. Schaeffer joins the Kidney, Urologic, and Hematologic
Diseases (KUH) Subcommittee.
Patrick Tso, Ph.D., is Professor of Pathology,
Associate Director of the Cincinnati Obesity Research Center, Director
of the Cincinnati Mouse Diabetes Phenotyping Center, and Director
of the Center for Lipid and Atherosclerosis Research at the University
of Cincinnati College of Medicine in Ohio. His research interests
include mechanisms of fat and cholesterol absorption in the digestive
tract and the study of food intake regulation by gastrointestinal
peptides. He is also studying the role of hypothalamic dysfunction
in the development of obesity in Zucker obese rats. Dr. Tso joins
the Digestive Diseases and Nutrition (DDN) Subcommittee.
NIDDK, a component of the NIH, conducts and supports research
in diabetes and other endocrine and metabolic diseases; digestive
diseases, nutrition, and obesity; and kidney, urologic, and hematologic
diseases. Spanning the full spectrum of medicine and afflicting
people of all ages and ethnic groups, these diseases encompass
some of the most common, severe, and disabling conditions affecting
Americans. For more information about NIDDK and its programs, see www.niddk.nih.gov.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) — The Nation's
Medical Research Agency — includes 27 Institutes and
Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services. It is the primary federal agency for conducting
and supporting basic, clinical and translational medical research,
and it investigates the causes, treatments, and cures for both
common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and
its programs, visit www.nih.gov. |