Life Sciences Institute Directors Named

University of Michigan President Lee C. Bollinger announced in October that he has selected two prominent scientists — a biochemist from the U-M and a cell biologist from the University of California, San Diego — to serve as lead scientists and co-directors of the U-M’s new Life Sciences Institute.

Jack E. Dixon Scott D. Emr

Jack E. Dixon, currently the Minor J. Coon Professor of Biological Chemistry and chair of Biological Chemistry in the Medical School, will begin his new position on July 1, 2001, after completing his term as department chair. Scott D. Emr, professor of cellular and molecular medicine in the School of Medicine at the University of California, San Diego, and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator, will become co-director in July 2002.

"We are very fortunate, indeed, to have as directors two great scientists who possess the personal qualities to attract and support other great scientists at our University," said Bollinger. "They will be outstanding as scientific leaders and co-directors of the Institute, maintaining their own excellent research efforts while jointly building the new institute from the ground up."

Currently under construction and scheduled for completion in spring 2003, the Institute building will contain laboratories and offices for 30 science faculty — dually appointed to their academic departments-of-origin as well as to the Institute — plus postdoctoral fellows, graduate students and staff.

— Sally Pobojewski

Additional information on the Initiative and the Institute may be found at:

http://www.lifesciences.umich.edu.