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Release: Immediate

Prestigious Academy of Arts and Sciences elects four UI professors

IOWA CITY, Iowa -- Four University of Iowa professors have been named to the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

The four are Dr. Francois Abboud, Edith King Pearson Professor of Cardiology and head of internal medicine; Dr. Antonio R. Damasio, Van Allen Distinguished Professor and head of neurology; Dr. Hanna Damasio, professor of neurology; and Linda K. Kerber, May Brodbeck Professor in the Liberal Arts and professor of history.

Founded in 1780, the Academy is a learned society with two purposes: to honor achievement in the natural sciences, social sciences, arts and humanities, and to conduct projects and programs in response to the needs and problems of society and the intellectual community. Its membership totals some 3,300 fellows and 550 foreign honorary members, and includes 168 Nobel Prize laureates and 58 Pulitzer Prize winners.

The other UI fellows are longtime Academy member James Van Allen, physics and astronomy; June Helm, anthropology, inducted in 1994; and James McPherson, creative writing, inducted in 1995. Former UI President Hunter Rawlings also was elected to the Academy in 1995, just before leaving the campus to serve as president of Cornell University.

The new fellows will be formally inducted into the Academy at a ceremony and dinner Sept. 27 at the House of the Academy in Cambridge, Mass. Of the 151 inductees this year, 25 are from Big 10 institutions. Five of the new fellows are from Northwestern University, five from the University of Illinois, four from the UI, four from the University of Michigan, three from the University of Wisconsin, two from the University of Minnesota and one each from Penn State and Indiana University.

Francois Abboud is Edith King Pearson Professor of Cardiology and head of the department of internal medicine in the UI College of Medicine. He also is professor of physiology and biophysics and director of the UI Cardiovascular Research Center.

He is known internationally for his research into hypertension and the circulatory system. He has done extensive research into the mechanisms of high blood pressure, heart failure, diabetes and aging. In addition, he is a member of numerous international professional associations and societies, including the National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine. He has been a very active member of the American Heart Association, of which he served as president. He also is a past president of the Association of American Physicians and of the American Federation for Clinical Research.

During his long career, he has received numerous honors and awards, including the ASPET Award for experimental therapeutics from the American Association for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, the Dickinson W. Richards Memorial Award, the Scientific Councils' Distinguished Achievement Award, and the Gold Heart Award, all from the American Heart Association, the Wiggers Award from the American Physiological Society, and the Iowa Chapter Laureate Award from the American College of Physicians. He received two international awards in the field of hypertension: the CIBA Award and Medal for Hypertension Research from the American Heart Association and the Merck Sharp and Dohme International Award for Research in Hypertension.

Abboud has written hundreds of research articles and has delivered hundreds of lectures to scientific audiences around the world. He also has served in numerous policy and scientific advisory positions with funding and research organizations.

He serves on the editorial board of many scientific journals and as an officer of several scientific foundations and funding agencies. His work has attracted more than $30 million in research funding to the UI.

He received his medical degree from the University of Cairo and Ain Chams University in Cairo, Egypt in 1955. He also holds honorary Doctor of Science degrees from the University of Lyon, France, and the Medical College of Wisconsin. He joined the UI faculty in 1960.

Antonio R. Damasio is Van Allen Distinguished Professor and head of the department of neurology in the UI College of Medicine. He also serves as chief of the Division of Behavioral Neurology and Cognitive Neuroscience at the UI.

He is world-renowned for his research into the complexities of the human brain, including investigations into memory, language and emotion. His most recent book, "Descartes' Error," has been published worldwide.

Along with his wife, Hanna, he has established one of the premier neuroscience research centers in the world. Together, the Damasios were the recipients of the 1993 Pessoa Prize.

Damasio is a member of numerous societies and associations, including the National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine. He is a member of the Council of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders, and he serves on the editorial board of many scientific journals. He has received a host of international honors for his research, among them the 1995 Golden Brain Award from the Minerva Foundation for his groundbreaking work on the brain basis of rationality, and the 1990 William Beaumont Award from the American Medical Association. He has published many scientific papers.

He received his medical degree from the University of Lisbon Medical School in 1969 and his doctorate in neuroscience from the same university in 1974. He joined the UI faculty in 1976.

Hanna Damasio is professor of neurology in the UI College of Medicine. She is director of the Laboratory for Neuroimaging and Human Neuroanatomy, co-director of the Division of Cognitive Neuroscience, and former director of the Migraine Clinic at the UI. She also holds an appointment as adjunct professor at the Salk Institute.

Hanna Damasio has developed new neuroimaging techniques using computers and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and positron emission tomography (PET) scans to study the functions of the brain. Her work has allowed the UI Division of Behavioral Neurology and Cognitive Neuroscience to conduct breakthrough science into emotion, memory and language. In 1995, she published, "Human Brain Anatomy in Computerized Images," the first atlas of the human brain to be based on MRI reconstructions of the living tissue rather than on the usual post-mortem specimens. Her efforts have helped neuroscientists identify the location of numerous neurological functions within the brain. Her neuroimaging work has garnered her international acclaim and many of the innovations she has developed have become standard in the field.

She is a member of numerous international professional and scientific organizations and associations, including the American Neurological Association, the British Brain Research Association and the World Federation of Neurology. She has served on the editorial boards of numerous scientific journals. She is the author of many scientific articles about the brain.

Along with her husband, Antonio, she has established one of the premier neuroscience research centers in the world. Together, the Damasios were the recipients of the 1993 Pessoa Prize and are also the co-authors of a book, "Lesion Analysis in Neuropsychology," which won the Most Outstanding Book Award from the Association of American Publishers in 1990.

She received her medical degree from the University of Lisbon Medical School in 1969. She joined the UI faculty in 1976.

Linda K. Kerber is widely considered one of the most distinguished historians in the United States. A pioneer in the area of women's history, she taught the first women's history course at the UI in 1972. She also co-edited the major textbook in the field, "Women's America: Refocusing the Past -- An Anthology," in print for 17 years and soon going into its fifth edition.

Her most recent book, "Towards an Intellectual History of Women: Essays by Linda Kerber," was published by the University of North Carolina Press earlier this year. She also is the author of "Women of the Republic: Intellect and Ideology in Revolutionary America," recently reprinted in paperback. Another book, "No Constitutional Right to Be Ladies: Women and the Obligations of Citizenship in American History," is scheduled to be published next year.

She has just completed a one-year term as president of the Organization of American Historians (OAH), the largest learned society devoted to the study and practice of U.S. history. As OAH president, she has been actively involved in a number of national issues, including the debate over national history standards, funding for the National Endowment for the Humanities and support for the National Historic Publications and Records Commission.

For her excellence in teaching, she received the UI Honors Program Faculty Award in 1996 and the Regents Award of Faculty Excellence in 1993. In addition, she was a recipient of National Endowment for the Humanities fellowships in 1976, 1983 and 1994, and was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1990-91.

Kerber received a doctorate from Columbia University in 1968 and holds an honorary doctorate from Grinnell College. She taught at Yeshiva University, San Jose State College and Stanford University before becoming an associate professor in the UI history department in 1971. She became a full professor in 1975 and has been a visiting professor at the University of Chicago.

5/2/97

* NOTE TO REPORTERS:

* For information about how to reach Dr. Francois Abboud, Dr. Antonio Damasio and Dr. Hanna Damasio, contact UI Health Science Relations at (319)335-8037.

* Professor Linda Kerber will be at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies Friday afternoon, (319)335-4034. Other numbers where she can be reached are: department of history, (319)335-2299, and at (319)351-8446.