First Endowed Chair in Dentistry

A $2-million gift to The University of Iowa Foundation from the estate of B.F. "Tod" Dewel, a 1925 graduate of the College of Dentistry and pioneer in orthodontics, will be used to create the first endowed chair in the College of Dentistry. The B.F. and Helen E. Dewel Chair in Clinical Orthodontics will be used to support the activities of a named recipient and enhance academic programs in orthodontics at the University.

Welsh Elected to National Academy of Sciences

Michael Welsh, professor of internal medicine and physiology and biophysics, and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator, was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in May.

Welsh is known internationally for his breakthrough gene therapy research into the genetic causes of cystic fibrosis and for his work in developing strategies to treat or possibly cure the disease. Their method involves using a vector, such as a disabled cold virus, to place corrected genes into cells.

The research team received a five-year, $7.1-million grant from the National Institutes of Health in 1999.

Welsh is the third UI faculty member named to the nation’s most distinguished scientific organization. The two others are Donald A. Gurnett, professor, and James A. Van Allen, emeritus professor, both in the Department of Physics and Astronomy.

Debaters Win National Award

Members of the University of Iowa’s A. Craig Baird Debate Forum were awarded the Copeland Trophy last March in recognition of the team’s superior record of wins.

This award is given to the top-ranked team going into the National Debate Tournament. More than 78 college and university teams competed in the 2000 tournament, and more than 25 teams from around the country applied for the Copeland Award.

Kristin Langwell, a senior from Lincolnwood, Ill., and Andy Ryan, a junior from Shreveport, La., won 89 percent of the 100 debates in which they competed during the season. In addition, the UI team was the only one to have both members receive individual recognition among the top ten debaters at the tournament. Langwell was ranked fifth and Ryan sixth among the 200 participants.

UI Professor Consults on Higher Education Reform in Thailand

To help strengthen the Thai higher education system, David Skorton, vice president for research and professor of medicine, electrical and computer engineering, and biomedical engineering, traveled to Thailand in March. Along with members of the Association of Thai Professionals in America and Canada, Skorton met with university and government officials and advised on reform measures that will make the Thai system of education operate autonomously. This will mean internal governance by faculty and administrators in Thai institutions and a greater emphasis on research and graduate education. Skorton has collaborated with colleagues at Asian universities in the past, in both medical and research administration fields. He also serves as co-chair of the Iowa chapter of the Korea-America Friendship Society. He plans to remain linked with the Thai group and will encourage other UI faculty and staff members to collaborate with their counterparts in Thailand.

Building Bridges

Ibrahim Al Khattat, adjunct assistant professor of engineering, merged functionality with environmental awareness and came up with a way to make strong, functional bridges out of an infinitely renewable Iowa resource.

Last spring Al Khattat, working with local schoolchildren and their parents and teachers, constructed a 62-foot-long bridge out of black locust trees, metal connectors, steel cables, and discarded shipping pallets. Black locusts grow wild along the highways and in ditches around Iowa; they are considered a "weed" tree. But the wood of the black locust does not decay and has twice the compressive strength of concrete.

"Just about everything used in my project is commercially worthless by present-day standards," Al Khattat says. "This technology opens up a vast new field of ‘green’ engineering research and applications."

A native of Iraq, Al Khattat has earned European Union and British funding, a patent, and a top invention award from the British Design Council for this new engineering model, formally known as LPSA (Light Post-tensioned Segmented Arch) technology.

The bridge, built with the help of the children and community of Coralville, Iowa, now stands on the grounds of Kirkwood Elementary School where it spans a creek and leads, appropriately, to a one-acre nature preserve.

Nancy L. Baker Heads University Libraries

When Nancy L. Baker was named the new UI librarian in April, she brought to the job more than 27 years of experience in library science and administration.

Baker, who is in charge of the University’s main and 11 branch libraries, succeeded Sheila Creth, who resigned in December. Barbara Dewey, director of Information and Research Services, served as interim University librarian.

Baker has served as associate director of Libraries for Public Services, University of Washington-Seattle, and as director of libraries at Washington State University in Pullman. She has taught at the University of Washington Graduate School of Library and Information Science in the Library Management Continuing Education Certificate Program, as well as at the University of Kentucky College of Library Science and the State University of New York, Binghamton.

Chemistry Professor Discovers Potential HIV Inhibitor

University of Iowa chemistry professor Vasu Nair and researchers at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) in Bethesda, Md., discovered potential HIV-inhibiting molecules that could one day prove therapeutically significant in the treatment of AIDS.

Although his National Institutes of Health-funded discovery is at an early stage of development and years away from any potential human testing, Nair said it is significant for its ability to stop HIV and for the way in which it attacks the virus.

"The single most devastating step in the attack of human cells by the HIV virus is the incorporation, or integration, of viral DNA into human chromosomal DNA. We have found small stable molecules that inhibit this integration," he said. "In 5 to 10 years’ time, one of the molecules or a closely related compound could become a drug targeted at the key step in the integration of viral DNA into human DNA. That would be a major advance toward strictly limiting the progression of AIDS."

Nair, internationally known for his work on antiviral compounds, was named UI Foundation Distinguished Professor of Chemistry in 1993.

Improving Our Workplace

The Improving Our Workplace Award (IOWA) recognizes outstanding contributions made by an individual or team of employees to improving quality in the workplace.

This past year’s individual winners were Renee Gould, nursing services, who was instrumental in evaluating, disseminating, educating, and supporting the use of safety products to decrease needle sticks at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics. Also, Roger Bienhoff, pathology, oversaw the renovation of research facilities in Medical Laboratories and the Medical Research Center, paying close attention to planning, customer needs, equipment requisition, and recycling to save money and consider the needs of people.

Team winners were the staff members in the Performing Arts Production Unit and the Departments of Dance and Theatre Arts for their teamwork in renovating Space/Place Theater with a very limited budget. They transformed the area to a safer, more comfortable place for audiences and artists alike. In addition, Employment and Printing Department staff members developed and implemented a process to improve the job application delivery method through the Printing Department’s scanning and web technology.

Genetic Research Continues

University of Iowa Health Care researchers, along with colleagues in the College of Engineering, received a three-year, nearly $6-million grant renewal to continue their work identifying and locating genes on the rat genome. The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, along with the National Eye Institute, renewed the grant.

Continuing as coprincipal investigators are Val C. Sheffield, professor of pediatrics and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute associate investigator; M. Bento Soares, associate professor of pediatrics and physiology and biophysics; and Thomas L. Casavant, professor of electrical and computer engineering.

The team has reached its initial goal of identifying more than 25,000 genes and localizing more than 8,000 genes to specific regions of the rat genome. The team will identify a total of 60,000 genes and, in collaboration with investigators at the Medical College of Wisconsin, place nearly 30,000 genes on the rat genomic map. The findings are expected to help scientists understand the human genome and aid in identifying genes involved in human diseases.

Six Million Listeners

Mark Weiger is flying high. The oboist and School of Music faculty member learned that selections from "Fantasy for WiZARDS!," a compact disc recording that he made with WiZARDS!, a double-reed quartet he helped found, is being featured on the American Airlines Audio Performance program "Command Performance" with a potential audience of 6 million passengers.

According to the director of audio programming for AEI Inflight, the company that provides American Airlines with its inflight entertainment, American Airlines has 272 audio-equipped aircraft in their fleet, both domestic and international. Those aircraft fly approximately 18,000 flights in total per month, exposing approximately 3 million passengers to the audio per month. As this audio program will play for two months, that’s approximately 6 million passengers who will be potentially exposed to the music.

WiZARDS! features the oboe, bassoon, English horn, oboe d’amore, contra bassoon, and piccolo oboe. In addition to Weiger, members of the group are Andrea Gullickson, oboe and oboe d’amore; S. Blake Duncan, English horn; and Greg Morton, bassoon. "Fantasy for WiZARDS!," their second CD, was released in December 1997 on the Crystal label. Their third CD, "Classical WiZARDRY," was released in April.