Biochemist Glimcher Cited For Hard-Tissue Research

Surgeons know that some of the most painful, costly, deadly diseases could be prevented or reversed if only medical science understood the molecular structure of phosphated proteins and their interaction with calcium. No surprise then that Melvin Glimcher—who has been responsible for a number of extraordinary research breakthroughs in this area—would become the first person to receive the Bristol-Myers/Zimmer Award for Distinguished Achievement in Orthopaedic Research. Glimcher director of the Laboratory for the Study of Skeletal Disorders and Rehabilitation at Children’s Hospital, Boston, and Harriet M. Peabody Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery at the Harvard Medical School, received the $25,000 award in recognition of his studies of how bones, teeth, arteries, and other tissues harden in the human body. He has identified five basic steps that lead to the hardening of tissue, as well as more than 10 unique combinations of phosphorus and proteins that attract calcium. Selected by an independent panel of leading orthopedic surgeons, Glimcher received the award during the American Orthopaedic Association annual meeting earlier this summer. “The hardening of tissue is such a basic physical development in living creatures that the immense implications of Dr. Glimcher’s work are hard to grasp,” says Clement Sledge, a colleague of Glimcher’s at Harvard Medical School. “He is a pioneer in examining the molecular structure of phosphated proteins and their interaction with calcium, opening the door to preventing or reversing some of the most painful, costly, and in some cases, deadly diseases affecting mankind.” This is the second prize Glimcher has received from Bristol-Myers this year. Earlier, a peer-review committee chose Children’s Hospital, Boston, to receive one of two unrestricted $250,000 Grants for Excellence in Orthopaedic Research, to help fund Glimcher’s work. The American Crystallographic Association presented three major awards at its annual meeting in Philadelphia. The newly established ACA Public Service Award went to Congressman Bill Nelson (D-Fla.). The award recognizes noncrystallographers who have made outstanding contributions to public policy issues related to science, especially those affecting basic research funding and public communication. Nelson chairs the Space Science and Applications Subcommittee in the House of Representatives. As payload specialist on a Columbia space shuttle flight in January 1986, Nelson performed experiments on the growth of protein crystals. Robert Birgeneau of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Paul Horn of IBM were honored for their contributions to the field of solid state physics with the Bertram Eugene Warren Diffraction Physics Award. And the Martin J. Buerger "Award was presented to George Jeffrey of the University of Pittsburgh for his studies of carbohy- drates and complex structures called clathrates. Baylor College of Medicine cell biologist Bert O’Malley has received the Endocrine Society’s highest award. Presented to O’Malley at the organization’s annual meeting in June, the Conrad Koch Award includes a medal and $10,000 honorarium. The Endocrine Society, composed of more than 5,500 endocrinologists, presents this award annually in honor of recent work of special distinction in the study of hormones. O’Malley first received acclaim in 1978 when a team he supervised was able to isolate and produce copies of the ovalbumin gene, a reproductive gene in chickens. He is working to isolate and clone genes for human reproductive hormones. North Carolina State University last month named an interim dean to head the College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences. Leslie B. Sims, the college’s associate dean for research and professor of chemistry, replaces former dean Garrett Briggs, who has been appointed as president of Peace College, Raleigh, N.C. Sims’ research interests in the field of physical chemistry include dynamics of chemical reactions, kinetic isotope effects, gas-phase kinetics, unimolecular reactions, and molecular vibrations. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has appointed five new members to the National Advisory General Medical Sciences Council. They are: C. Thomas Caskey, professor of molecular genetics and director of the Institute for Molecular Genetics at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston; Mary Ellen Jones, Kenan Professor of Biochemistry at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; David J.L. Luck, professor of cell biology at The Rockefeller University, New York City; John C. Ribble, professor of pediatrics and infectious diseases and dean of the University of Texas Medical School, Houston; and Palmer W. Taylor, professor and head of the Division of Pharmacology at the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine. The advisory council meets three times each year to review applications for research and research training grants. It also makes recommendations to the HHS and NIH on policy matters and science manpower needs relating to the NIH’s programs. John Kostis, chief of the Division of Cardiovascular Diseases at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, Newark, has been named occupant of the Detweiler Chair in Cardiology at the university’s Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. The endowment was provided to advance the school’s cardiovascular research efforts, particularly in the areas of atherosclerosis and hypertension. Joseph G. Gavin Jr., past president of Grumman Corp., Bethpage, N.Y., recently joined the board of directors of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. An aerospace engineer, his titles include: senior management consultant with Grumman Corp., director of the Pine Street Fund and Charles Draper Lab Inc., Huntington (N.Y.) Hospital trustee, and fellow of the American Astronomical Society. Glenn T. Seaborg was codiscoverer of plutonium. He was in on the identification of the chemical properties of nine additonal heavy metals. He created a significant revision of the periodic table. And he discovered the isotopes of numerous lighter elements. In light of these and other achievements, the National Science Board has honored him with the Vannevar Bush Award “for contributions to science spanning almost half a century" Seaborg, University Professor of Chemistry at the University of California, is a noted advocate for excellence in science and engineering education and for improvements in the public understanding of science. The International Aeronautical Federation has named Gerald S. Levy, of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, winner of the Charles Stark Draper Award for his innovative work in a three-year experiment. Levy is being honored for developing a new radio-astronomy technique—very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) —that uses an orbiting satellite and ground antennas in Australia and Japan. Conducting experiments from 1986 through 1988, Levy led an international team of scientists and engineers who were able to obtain better resolutions of three quasars than would have been possible in any ground-based radio studies at the same wavelength. VLBI theoretically creates an antenna with resolution equivalent to the effective distance between its groundbased and orbiting antennas, in this case a distance greater than the diameter of the Earth. The California Museum Foundation has named Harry B. Gray the 1988 California Scientist of the Year. Gray, Caltech’s Amold 0. Beckman Professor of Chemistry and director of the Beckman Institute, was awarded $5,000 and cited for making key discoveries in the study of the chemical reactions involved in electron transfer.

Biochemist Glimcher Cited For Hard-Tissue Research

The Scientist Staff

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