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September 25, 1997

PEOPLE OF THE TIMES

The American College of Health Association, the national organization of college health, presents awards for exceptional contributions. For 1997, Jan R. DeVoe, clinical coordinator at Pitt's Student Health Service for more than 20 years, was awarded the Mogul Garcia-Tunon Memorial Award in Human Dignity. This award is presented to individuals whose work, life, writing, research and way of living has promoted the cause of human dignity and nurtured the appreciation of human differences.

DeVoe's contributions to her community include membership in Community AIDS Educators and volunteer work with the Pittsburgh chapter of the NAMES Project and the Pittsburgh AIDS Task Force.

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Mark Moir, an assistant professor of computer science, was one of 20 faculty members chosen to receive a Junior Faculty Enhancement Award from Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU) for the 1997-98 academic year. The grants of $5,000 are intended to allow faculty members from ORAU member institutions to enhance their research during the early stages of their careers. Each recipient's institution matches the ORAU award with an additional $5,000.

Moir's research involves transparent support for efficient, wait-free transactions in shared memory multiprocessors. The use of locking in multiprocessor applications can cause performance bottlenecks, priority inversion, and susceptibility to failures. Moir aims to eliminate these problems through transparent mechanisms for incorporating wait-free implementations of user-supplied transactions. Wait-free implementations ensure that processes are never caused to wait by the delay of other processes.

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James H. Herndon, David Silver Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery at the School of Medicine, associate vice chancellor for Health Sciences, chairperson of orthopaedic surgery and vice president for medical services at the UPMC Health Systems, was chosen as the second president-elect of the American Orthopaedic Association.

The association, founded in 1887, is the senior English-speaking orthopaedic organization. Membership is earned by those who have made a significant contribution to the education, research and practice of orthopaedic surgery.

Herndon is a nationally recognized orthopaedic surgeon with special interest in degenerative diseases of the hand and wrist. For the past year, he has led the surgical team treating patients in the world's first clinical trial of gene therapy for arthritis. Herndon has been the principal investigator or co-investigator on more than 30 orthopaedic research grants and has published nearly 200 papers and abstracts, 10 books and 24 book chapters related to orthopaedic medicine and surgery.

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Kelly Dyer has been appointed residence life coordinator/student activities director at the Titusville campus. Before coming to UPT, Dyer was a graduate adviser for residence hall activities and summer conference staff coordinator at the University of Akron and resident supervisor at Oriana House in Akron, Ohio. She has been an active member of the National Association for Campus Activities (NACA) since 1993 and a member of the NACA Great Lakes Spring Festival Committee. She also is a member of the Central Atlantic Affiliate of College and University Residence Halls and the Ohio College Personnel Association. Patricia Gay Carnevali, executive director of the Pasquerilla Performing Arts Center at the Johnstown campus, has been named to the PA Presenters Board of Directors. Carnevali joined the UPJ staff in 1990. She holds a bachelor's degree in drama/literature from Wheaton College and a master's in arts administration from the College Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati.

PA Presenters is a consortium of presenters and other people related to the arts that was established in 1987 as a service organization to benefit the public by working with member organizations and institutions in providing educational, artistic and cultural presentations for the residents of Pennsylvania.

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Vittorio Paolone, associate professor of physics, has received an Outstanding Junior Investigator Award from the U.S. Department of Energy Division of High Energy Physics. One of only five awards made this year, it is given to promising nontenured physicists who demonstrate significant contributions to high-energy physics and leadership in the field. The award recognizes not only accomplishments, but also expresses confidence that recipients will make important contributions in the future. Paolone's award comes with $80,000 in research funds per year for three years, to be used for the specific needs of the researcher, and to help increase his independence and scope in formulating and pursing his own research goals.

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The Urban Redevelopment Authority of Pittsburgh recently celebrated its 50th anniversary and recognized persons whose commitment and dedication has enriched the development of the City of Pittsburgh. Among these recognized were: Morton Coleman, graduate program in social work; social work Dean David Epperson, and Thomas Foerster, Institute of Politics. Alan Teich, Johnstown campus associate professor of psychology, has been named interim chair of the college's natural sciences division. Teich replaces William Brice, professor of geology, who served as chairperson of the division since 1993. Brice returned to his teaching duties on a full-time basis this fall. Teich is a practicing licensed psychologist, co-developer of and co-presenter for the Education Program for Separating Parents, and group leader for the Johnstown Area Cancer Support Group.


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