Lawrence Coleman, a UC Davis professor of physics and former vice provost for research at the University of California system, has been named a senior fellow with the National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges http://www.nasulgc.org, a public university association. As senior fellow, Coleman will contribute to a new national initiative, Science and Mathematics Teacher Imperative, designed to increase the number and diversity of high-quality middle school and high school science and mathematics teachers prepared by member universities and other higher education institutions. The teacher initiative is led by a national commission of leaders from universities, schools and industry chaired by Richard Herman, chancellor of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

Michael Lewis, professor emeritus of brewing science and a prominent member of the brewing community, was awarded the prestigious 2008 Brewers Association Recognition Award at the annual Craft Brewers Conference. The award recognizes his dedication and service to the industry. With more than 30 years of teaching experience, Lewis has taught many of the prominent players in the American brewing industry and has served as the academic director of the UC Davis Extension professional brewing programs for the past 25 years.

Alexander Mogilner, professor of mathematics, has been appointed as chair of the Modeling and Analysis of Biological Systems Study Section by the Center for Scientific Review, part of the National Institutes of Health. Study sections carry out peer review of applications for NIH grants.

The A.W. Mellon Foundation recently chose Benjamin Houlton, an assistant professor in the Department of Land, Air and Water Resources, for a junior faculty research grant in the field of conservation and the environment. The three-year award will allow Houlton to invest in scholarly activities at UC Davis, including training of undergraduate and graduate students, and postdoctoral scholars.

Charlie Bamforth, professor and chair of the Department of Food Science and Technology, was recently selected to be a fellow of the International Academy of Food Science and Technology. He and other members of the new class of fellows will be formally inducted into the academy in October during the 14th World Food Congress in Shanghai, China. The fellows are distinguished food scientists and technologists who are elected by their peers to the academy, which supports and advises the nonprofit International Union of Food Science and Technology.

Veterinary professor Susan Stover was recently recognized as one of the Outstanding Women in Thoroughbred Horseracing. The honor came in the form of a California legislative resolution presented April 11 during a special ceremony at Santa Anita Race Park. The resolution acknowledged the importance of Stover's research on the horse's muscle and bone structure in identifying potential causes of serious injuries in racehorses. Stover directs the J.D. Wheat Veterinary Orthopedic Research Laboratory, one of several centers in the School of Veterinary Medicine dedicated to the health issues of equine athletes.

Kathy Keatley Garvey, communications specialist for the Department of Entomology, won the gold award, the top award in the newswriting category, from the international Association for Communication Excellence (ACE). The annual competition drew 400 entries, with Garvey scoring 99 out of 100 points. A journalist, editor and photographer, Garvey began working at UC Davis in 1986. She co-authored the book, "Aquatic Pest Control." Garvey will receive a plaque at the ACE awards banquet June 11 in Traverse City, Mich. ACE is comprised of communicators and information technologists in universities, government and research organizations.

Ishwarlal Jialal, a professor of internal medicine in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine has won two awards in his field -- the 2008 Philip Levine Award for Outstanding Research and the Linus Pauling Award. The American College for Advancement in Medicine presented Jialal the Linus Pauling Award for notable achievement in the field of integrative medicine on April 11 at its spring conference in Orlando. ACAM represents more than 1,000 physicians in 30 countries. The Philip Levine Award for "outstanding research" will be given to Jialal in October at the American Society for Clinical Pathology's conference in Baltimore. Jialal is also the Robert Stowell Endowed Chair in Experimental Pathology and the director of the Laboratory for Atherosclerosis and Metabolic Research.

Cooperative Extension honeybee specialist Eric Mussen has received the Distinguished Achievement Award in Extension from the Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America, which includes 1,500 members in the western United States and Canada. Mussen, whose career spans 31 years at UC Davis, was recognized for the depth of his scientific knowledge about honeybees and the program he has developed to communicate that information to industry and the general public. Mussen also has played a key role in rebuilding the honeybee program at the entomology department's Harry Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility.

Hanspeter Witschi, a professor emeritus in the Department of Molecular Biosciences, has received the Merit Award for 2008 from the Society of Toxicology. The award recognizes his distinguished contributions to the field of toxicology throughout his career, referring to him as "a thinking man's pathologist" who has published seminal articles in pulmonary toxicology, adaptation to toxicant exposure, second-hand smoke and lung carcinogenesis.

The Corporation for National and Community Service has named UC Davis to the President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll for exemplary service efforts and service on behalf of disadvantaged youth. Launched in 2006, the Community Service Honor Roll is the highest federal recognition a school can achieve for its commitment to service-learning and civic engagement. Honorees for the award were chosen based on a series of selection factors, including scope and innovativeness of service projects, percentage of student participation in service activities, incentives for service, and the extent to which the school offers academic service-learning courses. UC Davis' application was submitted by Human Corps and the Internship and Career Center on behalf of the chancellor's office.

The Republic of Austria's prestigious Cross of Honor for Science and Art First Class has been awarded to Erich Loewy, a professor emeritus of medicine. Loewy, whose family fled Austria during World War II, was trained as a cardiologist at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. Then he went to the University of Illinois and began his lifelong work in bioethics. In 1996, he was chosen as the first endowed UC Davis School of Medicine Alumni Association Chair of Bioethics. Loewy is an internationally recognized voice for ethics in medical education, ethical theory, ethics in geriatric and palliative care, and social, clinical and research ethics. In April, Austrian Consul General Martin Weiss from the Austrian Consulate in Los Angeles presented the honor to Loewy in Sacramento.

Alan Hastings, considered by his peers one of the world's top mathematical ecologists, is editor-in-chief of a new journal, Theoretical Ecology, which published its first quarterly issue in March. For its first year, the journal is an open access journal, online at: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1874-1746. In 2007, the UC Davis Academic Senate awarded him the Faculty Research Lectureship. In 2006, he received the Robert H. MacArthur Award, the highest honor given by the Ecological Society of America.

Professor Andrew Waterhouse, interim chair of the Department of Viticulture and Enology, delivered a keynote lecture titled "Polyphenols and Inflammatory Effects" for the joint session of two international conferences on polyphenols and health held in November in Kyoto, Japan. The session brought together participants from both the Third International Conference on Polyphenols and Health and the International Conference on Food Factors. Waterhouse, a wine chemist, holds the John E. Kinsella Endowed Chair in Food, Nutrition and Health.