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April 12, 2007
Mei Hong named first Corbett Professor in Chemistry
- Mei Hong, professor of chemistry at Iowa State University, has been named
the first John D. Corbett Professor in Chemistry at Iowa State University.
Since her arrival on campus in 1999, Hong has received numerous awards including
the prestigious American Chemical Society's Award in Pure Chemistry in 2003.
This award recognizes and encourages fundamental research in pure chemistry
carried out in North America by young men and women. Six of its awardees
have received the Nobel Prize. Hong is only the third person from Iowa State
to receive this award. Frank Spedding and Orville Chapman are the other
recipients.
Her other awards include a Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, a National Science
Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award, the Research Corporation's Research Innovation
Award, the Beckman Young Investigator Award for innovation and the NSF POWRE
Award.
Hong's research into antimicrobial peptides may one day lead to vaccines
to cure or more effectively fight a variety of diseases including bacterial
infection, AIDS and even ulcers. Hong says that as her research group's
ability, through nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, to study the three-dimensional
structure of membrane proteins improves, they will be able to build better
profiles that will allow for the development of peptides that selectively
and potently attack bacteria cells.
"Bright, vibrant, ambitious scientists like Mei are crucial to the
future of our department and to the University" said Jacob Petrich,
professor and chair of the Department of Chemistry. "We need to keep
people like Mei at Iowa State and to attract others like her to come here.
The Corbett Professorship will help us to achieve this goal.”
The Corbett Professorship in Chemistry was established by John Corbett,
Distinguished Professor of liberal arts and sciences, professor of chemistry
and senior chemist with the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory.
Corbett has made plans through his estate to support a three-year professorship
for a faculty member in the Department of Chemistry at $100,000 a year over
a period of time. A majority of the funding will go towards professional
support and expenses each year including discretionary research funding,
stipends, operating expense, equipment and travel. The remaining yearly
funds will be used to enhance the faculty member's salary.
"This professorship is designed to reward outstanding faculty members
like Mei Hong" Corbett said. "As a former department chair, I'm
very familiar with the troubles the Department of Chemistry has had for
keeping faculty here at Iowa State. People who do well here get national
recognition and are very attractive to other colleges and universities.
I'm hopeful this will help in the reward and retention of those current
and future faculty members."
Mei Hong
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