Newsmakers

Free University of Berlin awards Kirby honorary doctorate

The department for the history of science and cultural sciences of the Free University of Berlin awarded an honorary doctorate on June 21 to William C. Kirby, Edith and Benjamin Geisinger Professor of History and former dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. In awarding the degree, the university wrote that it “served to honor one of the world’s leading China experts, who has helped to advance the study of Chinese history in an international context.”

Kirby has received numerous academic distinctions, among them membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. During the summer of 1996, he was a visiting professor at the Free University of Berlin. In 1972, he studied history there as a scholarship recipient.

Nathan wins medicine’s triple crown

David G. Nathan, Robert A. Stranahan Distinguished Professor of Pediatrics and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, has won two of medicine’s most prestigious awards in the same month. In April, he received the George Kober Medal, the top award in internal medicine, for his contributions to research on inherited blood disorders. Then he took the 2006 Walker Prize of the Museum of Science, Boston, for scientific investigation and discovery. Nathan adds these to the John Howland Award, the highest honor of the American Pediatric Society, given to him in 2003. Only two other physicians have won both the Kober and the Howland medal.

A Cambridge, Mass., native, Nathan graduated cum laude from Harvard College in 1951 and cum laude from Harvard Medical School in 1955. By 1968, he headed the division of hematology at Children’s Hospital Boston and served as physician-in-chief of Children’s from 1985 to 1995. He co-wrote “Hematology of Infancy and Childhood,” the leading textbook in this field. From 1995 to 2000, Nathan was president of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

MEEI physician Cheney appointed HMS professor

Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary (MEEI) physician Mack Cheney has been promoted to Harvard Medical School (HMS) professor of otology and laryngology. Cheney completed a clinical fellowship in facial plastic and reconstructive surgery at MEEI – a teaching partner of HMS – and has served as the director of MEEI’s Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery Service since 1988. His major areas of focus have been head and neck reconstruction, reanimation of the paralyzed face, and auricular (ear) reconstruction.

A resident of Brookline, Mass., Cheney is an active member of several professional societies, including the American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, the New England Otolaryngology Society, and the Association for Research in Otolaryngology. In addition, Cheney is a founder and a current board member of the Medical Missions for Children Foundation. Through this foundation, he participates in surgical missions to provide pediatric head and neck reconstruction in Quito, Ecuador.