Awards and Recognition

Mike Osterholm co-authors an editorial in the NY Times, "Is It a Pandemic Yet?"; Stephanie Carlson is quoted in Fatherly about the developmental reason kids love it when parents play monster; Ted Hinchcliffe and James Robinson are mentioned in an Austin Daily Herald story about a collaboration between The Hormel Institute and Mayo Clinic that is looking to find a treatment for brain cancer in children; Kirsten Delegard is interviewed in a CNN story about racist language woven into home deeds across America; Jeffrey Grell is quoted in Quartz about what a RICO charge means for Huawei; Ashley Thompson is quoted in the Star Tribune about the leap year tradition for women to ask men to marry; Walter Low, Jian-Ping Wang, and others are quoted in a Minnesota Daily story about U research to create an implantable brain chip to combat neurological diseases.

The Bentson Foundation is giving $15 million to the University of Minnesota to reverse lower rates of undergraduate admission, retention, and graduation among students with the greatest financial need. This gift brings the Bentson Foundation and family’s cumulative giving to the University to over $50 million, largely in support of students. Announced by University President Joan Gabel at the February Board of Regents meeting, the Bentson Foundation’s gift will create new opportunities for low-income undergraduate students on every campus and provide significant incentive funding to encourage other donors to establish scholarship endowments that help these students by creating the Bentson Scholarship Challenge.

The University of Minnesota and the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust and health care systems across the Twin Cities announced the creation of the Minnesota Mobile Resuscitation Consortium (MMRC) and its mobile extracorporeal membrane oxygenation vehicles. This is a collaborative initiative to treat cardiac arrest as quickly as possible in Minnesota. The MMRC, made possible by an $18.6 million grant from the Helmsley Charitable Trust, aims to save the lives of cardiac arrest patients in scenarios which traditional resuscitation efforts have failed. Every 10-minute delay in treatment for these patients increases the chances of mortality by 15 to 25 percent.

Children’s cancer, brain tumors, pancreatic cancer and a range of neurological conditions comprise the diseases targeted by this year’s research projects selected by the Minnesota Partnership for Biotechnology and Medical Genomics. Five separate competitive grants will help partnering researchers advance early studies in medical science impacting conditions that have statewide impact. Each project is a collaborative effort between the University of Minnesota and a Mayo Clinic investigator, taking an approach that could not be pursued by either institution independently. This is the 17th year for the state-funded awards, which this year will provide medical researchers a total of $4.6 million. 

As part of the Blue Ridge Institute for Medical Research rankings, the University of Minnesota School of Nursing rose to 10th in the latest ranking of National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding to schools of nursing. With nearly $6 million in NIH awards to the School of Nursing and Earl E. Bakken Center for Spirituality & Healing in 2019, the Blue Ridge Institute for Medical Research (BRIMR) placed the University of Minnesota tops among Big Ten institutions and fourth among all public universities.

Colleen McDonald Diouf, CEO of Community-University Health Care Center, has been elected Federally Qualified Urban Healthcare Network (FUHN) board chair. FUHN constitutes a group of ten community clinics serving as a safety net Accountable Care Organization that has saved the state of Minnesota over $22 million dollars in a Medicaid Demonstration project.

Emily Vraga is quoted in a Scientific American story about how attempts at debunking “fake news” about epidemics might do more harm than good; President Joan Gabel and Carl Anderson are quoted in a Minnesota Daily story about Gabel’s plan to address student mental health on campus; George Weiblen is quoted in the Star Tribune about an existential regulatory threat to the fledgling hemp industry; Carrie Henning-Smith was interviewed at KARE 11 about why people are so lonely; Daniel Handeen and Ryan Pesch are quoted at Minnesota Public Radio about an increase in winter veggie gardens in Minnesota as home greenhouse options grow.

The Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost has announced that ten faculty members have been named as the 2020-22 McKnight Land-Grant Professors. The goal of this program is to advance the careers of assistant professors at a crucial point in their professional lives. The professorship includes a research grant of $25,000 in each of the two years of the award, to be used for expenditures related to the recipient’s research/scholarly work.

Erin L. Durban, Anthropology, College of Liberal Arts, Twin Cities

Joseph R. Farag, Asian & Middle Eastern Studies, College of Liberal Arts, Twin Cities

Samuel C. Fletcher, Philosophy, College of Liberal Arts, Twin Cities

Lindsay Glesener, School of Physics & Astronomy, College of Science and Engineering, Twin Cities

Sarah M. Greising, School of Kinesiology, College of Education and Human Development, Twin Cities

Branden Moriarty, Pediatrics, Medical School, Twin Cities

Christopher Pexa, English, College of Liberal Arts, Twin Cities

Anthony Schroeder, Math, Science & Technology, Crookston

Andrew D. Wickert, Earth & Environmental Sciences, College of Science and Engineering, Twin Cities

Alik S Widge, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Medical School, Twin Cities

Sylia Wilson, Institute of Child Development, College of Education and Human Development, Twin Cities

Learn more about the award recipients and their work.

The Blue Ridge Institute for Medical Research has recognized the University of Minnesota Medical School as the 27th most funded institution by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in the 2019 NIH rankings. The University of Minnesota Medical School improved three positions from last year’s spot as 30th (and 33rd in 2018). In addition, five of the Medical School’s departments –Biochemistry, Molecular Biology and Biophysics; Neuroscience; Family Medicine and Community Health; Pediatrics; and Rehabilitation Medicine ranked in the top 10 for department-specific rankings. Several other departments also improved rankings in 2019.

Paul Sackett, the Beverly and Richard Fink Distinguished Professor in the Department of Psychology, has been awarded the Dunnette Prize from the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology. Sackett, only the third recipient of the $50,000 award, was given this honor for his extensive work expanding knowledge of the role of individual differences in workplace, higher education, and military settings.