Blau named Baxter
professor of Pharmacology
BY JOYCE THOMAS
Helen M. Blau, PhD,
professor and chair of molecular pharmacology, has been
named the new Donald E. and Delia B. Baxter Professor of
Pharmacology, effective April 1. Blau's research has had
a major impact on the understanding of how cells become
and remain differentiated during development. Her
experiments demonstrated that the differentiated state,
rather than being fixed and irreversible, is dynamic and
requires continuous regulation. Her research challenged
the prevailing dogma that once differentiated, cell
function and gene expression could not easily be changed.
Molecular pharmacologist
Tag E. Mansour, PhD, who has held the post since being
named the first Baxter chair in 1978, will now become
Baxter professor emeritus. Mansour, a member of the
Stanford medical faculty since 1961, retired in December.
Blau, director of Gene
Therapy Technology at Stanford, organized the Medical
School's first gene therapy symposium, which was held in
March and featured presentations by renowned geneticists
and developmental biologists from around the world. Blau
was also instrumental in bringing about a $5 million
collaborative initiative between France-based
pharmaceutical company Rhône-Poulenc Rorer/Gencell and
Stanford. Through the initiative, Stanford has been
awarded four major research grants this year and received
funding for eight gene therapy research projects last
year.
Among the current work
being conducted in Blau's lab is a novel gene therapy
approach that helps create blood vessel structures
similar to those produced during embryonic development.
The technique holds promise for clinical applications for
diabetes and heart disease.
Blau, who was born in
London and received her undergraduate degree from the
University of York, UK, obtained her doctorate from
Harvard University in 1975. She completed a postdoctoral
fellowship in the division of medical genetics,
departments of biochemistry and biophysics, at the
University of California, San Francisco. She joined the
Stanford medical faculty in 1978 and became a tenured
associate professor in 1986. She was promoted to
professor in 1991 and was named chair of the Department
of Molecular Pharmacology in March 1997.
Blau is an elected member
of the Institute of Medicine and a fellow of the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences. She also serves on the
board of the American Society of Gene Therapy. Blau
received the 1999 Excellence in Science Award from the
55,000 member Federation of American Societies for
Experimental Biology for her pioneering research.
The Baxter professorship
was established in 1972 with funds provided by the Baxter
Foundation of Los Angeles. The chair was endowed by Delia
Baxter in honor of her late husband, a distinguished
physician, engineer and scientist who pioneered the
commercial preparation of intravenous solutions. Dr.
Baxter, who was born in 1882 and died in 1935, received
his medical degree from the University of Louisville in
1909.
He served in World War II
with the American Red Cross and oversaw the tuberculosis
hospitals in France. After the War, he practiced at the
Rockefeller Hospital in Peking, China, during which time
both China and India experienced major cholera epidemics,
resulting in the deaths of many victims from dehydration.
Baxter realized that injecting vital solutions directly
into the bloodstream could have combated the dehydration,
but intravenous fluids were not generally available then
in either China or the United States. He returned to the
United States in 1921 determined to remedy this critical
problem. After many years of research, he developed the
technology that led to safe commercially prepared
solutions and made possible today's widespread use of
intravenous therapy. SR
|
