Lamar Dodd Award – Page 2 – Research Awards

John Maerz

ovprweb on April 3, 2020

Lamar Dodd Creative Research Award 2020

John Maerz, Josiah Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources, is a foremost vertebrate ecologist who studies processes that create and sustain biodiversity in a rapidly changing world. He applies his understanding of ecology, evolutionary biology and wildlife management to advance knowledge of many species’ natural history and inform conservation activities. Maerz’s research combines a deep understanding of both organismal and ecosystems ecology and the challenging interface between the two. His cross-disciplinary studies have allowed him to ask fundamental questions about organisms and ecosystems while producing information critical to solving real-world environmental problems. His work focuses on amphibians and reptiles, but he also studies birds and invertebrates. Maerz’s current research addresses the impacts of nonnative species, climate and land use on the ecology of native wildlife, while examining how animals influence ecosystem processes and how ecological principles can be applied to inform the conservation and management of wildlife.

Lance Wells

ovprweb on March 21, 2019

Lamar Dodd Creative Research Award 2019

Lance Wells, professor in the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center, conducts research that provides a foundation for understanding O-glycans, which play a critical role in determining protein structure, function and stability. Aberrations in these molecules are responsible for certain human diseases and also associated with disease risk factors. Wells’ laboratory work on O-glycans has shown a creative fusion of cutting-edge “omic” biochemical analytics with an ability to identify important and novel biological questions. He deploys an innovative combination of methodologies, including mass spectrometry, protein biochemistry, genetics, proteomics and cell and molecular biology. Wells’ experiments have greatly helped advance understanding of the roles of these molecules in biology. For instance, his research into abnormal O-glycans underlying congenital muscular dystrophy has provided a molecular understanding of the etiology of this disease. His work has also elucidated a number of high-potential therapeutic targets in disease states such as Alzheimer’s, Type 2 diabetes and cancer.

Daniel Nakano

ovprweb on March 22, 2016

Creative Research Award 2016

Daniel Nakano, Distinguished Research Professor of Mathematics, is renowned for his contributions to representation theory, which includes the study of Lie algebras, algebraic groups and quantum groups. This important branch of mathematics impacts many fields, including chemistry and physics, as it originated from attempts to understand symmetry in nature. In representation theory, an abstract algebraic entity is realized as matrices of numbers. Nakano’s research provides important fundamental advances, and he has a history of groundbreaking results through the creation of new approaches or solutions. His expertise and leadership was critically important to the success of UGA’s National Science Foundation Vertical Integration of Research and Education in Mathematics Program, which was designed by the NSF to better integrate research into the mathematics curriculum at all levels. Nakano’s work has garnered international recognition and has contributed to making UGA a center of mathematics research in representation theory.

Previous awards
Distinguished Research Professor 2010
Creative Research Medal 2007

Allen Moore

on February 24, 2016

Lamar Dodd Creative Research Award 2017

Allen Moore, Distinguished Research Professor of Genetics, is an evolutionary behavior geneticist who conducts research on the genetics of sociality using insects, which have often played key roles in elucidating the evolution of social behavior. His work combines theoretical and statistical approaches to tackle evolutionarily important problems in behavior, and then brings the full arsenal of modern molecular techniques to dissect the underlying mechanisms. Moore has selected his insect systems in a way that allows him to manipulate experimentally varied social behaviors, including aggression, mating, altruism, and notably, parental care. In his latest advance, Moore uses genomic approaches to understand complex behavioral traits in burying beetles. His work will test the importance of specific genes in determining differences between care provided by mothers and fathers, and between single parents and biparental teams. It may open the doors to understanding pathways of gene interaction both within parents and between parents and offspring.

Previous Award

Distinguished Research Professor 2014

Sidney Kushner

on February 23, 2016

Lamar Dodd Award 2013

Sidney Kushner

Sidney Kushner, Distinguished Research Professor of genetics, has established himself as a world-class bacterial geneticist whose research has had a major impact on a variety of important fields. In his early work, Kushner identified the genetic switch that controls two distinct pathways by which E. coli is able to repair DNA damaged by UV irradiation. Later, his laboratory was the first to express a eukaryotic gene in E. coli. Subsequently, his laboratory developed important new tools that helped promote rapid advances in gene cloning technology. However, he is perhaps most celebrated for his discoveries relating to the importance of messenger RNA (mRNA) turnover in the control of gene expression. His groundbreaking studies have led to major new insights into the biochemistry and biology of the enzymes that have now emerged as central players in many RNA regulatory systems in a variety of organisms.

Previous Award

Distinguished Research Professor 2008

Richard B. Meagher

on February 23, 2016

Entrepreneur of the Year Award

Richard Meagher, Distinguished Research Professor of Genetics, is a plant molecular geneticist whose research has sparked worldwide interest and media attention. Widely noted for his creativity, innovation and perseverance, Meagher was the first scientist to engineer plants to take up toxins from the soil, a field now known as phytoremediation. He established himself as a leading authority on the plant cytoskeleton and,more recently, on monoclonal antibody production. UGA recognized Meagher’s research accomplishments in 2001, when he received the Lamar Dodd Award for an outstanding body of research in the sciences, and again in 2004, when he received the Inventor’s Award for his patents and other contributions to thebiotech industry in Georgia. During his tenure at UGA, Meagher has founded several biotechnology companies based on research in his laboratory. In addition to his outstanding research, Meagher has been a devoted teacher and mentor as well as a leader in bringing new technologies to research and service facilities at UGA.

Previous Awards

Distinguished Research Professor 2007
Inventor’s Award 2004
Lamar Dodd Award 2001

Stephen P. Hubbell

on February 23, 2016

Lamar Dodd Award 2006

Stephen P. Hubbell, a Distinguished Research Professor of Plant Biology, has created a mathematical theory to explain general patterns in the distribution of biological diversity on earth from local to global scales. Originally published as The Unified Neutral Theory of Biodiversity and Biogeography (2001), the theory unifies previously unconnected theory in population biology and island biogeography with speciation theory. The theory has generated great excitement but also consternation among ecologists. The controversy is because, despite its simplified neutral approach, it works remarkably well, accurately describing many observed patterns of species diversity that had previously resisted theoretical explanation. His book has already become a citation classic and his theory has spawned a significant growth industry in theoretical ecology, resulting in a spate of derivative publications in leading scientific journals such as Nature and Science. Hubbell is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He is also a Pew Fellow in Conservation Biology, and in 2004 was awarded the prestigious Marsh Global Prize in Ecology by the British Ecological Society.

Previous Award

Distinguished Research Professor 2003

Patricia Adair Gowaty

on February 23, 2016

Distinguished Research Professor 2003

Patricia Adair Gowaty, Professor of Ecology, studies the evolution of social behavior, especially among Eastern bluebirds, and is among the leading scholars in behavioral ecology. By boldly asking questions from a feminine perspective, Dr. Gowaty has overturned many fundamental assumptions about social interaction, mate selection, monogamy, two-parent care of nestlings, and other social behaviors that determine reproductive success. For example, she has shown that two parents are not required for bluebird nesting success, that female bluebirds are not monogamous – up to 50 percent of their nests contain young sired by multiple fathers – and that one-fifth of nestlings are sired by fathers other than the one raising them. Based on her landmark findings, other scientists have looked for and found evidence of extra-pair paternity in more than 90 percent of the 100 or so species investigated. A 1999 Lamar Dodd Award recipient, Dr. Gowaty is a Fellow, former President and Quest Award recipient of the Animal Behavior Society, and a Fellow and past Vice President of the American Ornithologists’ Union. She holds a life-time appointment on the International Ornithological Committee, the governing body of the International Ornithological Congress.

Previous Award

Lamar Dodd Award 1999

Andrew H. Paterson

on February 23, 2016

Lamar Dodd Award 2009

Andrew H. Paterson

Andrew H. Paterson, professor of crop and soil sciences, plant biology and genetics, and Distinguished Research Professor and Director of the Plant Genome Mapping Laboratory, is a world leader in the mapping and sequencing of flowering-plant genomes. His work has yielded greater understanding of flowering plants’ common ancestors and also of the evolutionary paths leading to present-day plants that provide food, feed, fiber, and fuel. Paterson pioneered molecular mapping methods that have been adopted across the life sciences, and he developed broadly applicable techniques for identifying and characterizing genetic variations in natural populations—such as the differences between elite crop varieties and “also-rans.” He recently led an international collaboration that completed the sequencing and analysis of the sorghum genome, only the second cereal genome to be sequenced, and he currently leads another international group in sequencing cotton. He was recently elected an AAAS Fellow.

Previous Award

Distinguished Research Professor 2002

Gregory H. Robinson

on February 23, 2016

Lamar Dodd Award 2010

Gregory H. Robinson, Franklin Professor of Chemistry, is recognized worldwide as a leading scientist in the synthesis of unusual main group element chemical compounds. In 1995, he was the first to install a triple bond between two gallium atoms. More recently, his research group synthesized the first neutral compound containing a double bond between two boron atoms-the first diborene-by using stabilizing bases. In 2008, his research team stunned the scientific community by discovering a new base-stabilized soluble allotrope of elemental silicon. In this compound, two silicon atoms, each in the highly reactive zero-oxidation state, are connected by a double bond. This achievement was hailed in top journals, including Science, the Journal of the American Chemical Society, Nature, and Chemical and Engineering News as “a major advance in low-valent, low coordinate main group chemistry” and one that “opens up new unprecedented possibilities in organometallic chemistry.” This technique of employing bases as stabilizing influences for otherwise fleeting molecules is widely considered a seminal discovery. The work of Robinson’s group has provided both a stimulus for main group element chemical research and textbook examples for new science. Not only does this work challenge traditional theories of structure and bonding, but it also paves the way for new insights and applications into chemical processes and applications.

Previous Award

Distinguished Research Professor 2000