Just another few lines of evidence of the ascendancy of microbiology to report.
#1 - At UC Davis Microbiology is very big and getting bigger.
Consider this. The Dean of the School of Medicine, Claire Pomeroy is an infectious disease expect and microbiologist.
The new Dean of the College of Biological Sciences, James Hildreth research focuses on HIV.
The new Dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine Michael Lairmore specializes in HTLVs (human T-lymphotropic viruses).
Microbes seem to be literally taking over the place here ...
#2 The Institute of Medicine (IOM) has been picking more and more microbiologists.
Already there are many microbiologists in the Institute of Medicine. Not surprising of course as microbiology is a major area of medical research. (I note, two of the three people I listed above - Hildreth and Larimore and in the IOM).
And now today the IOM announced newly elected members. IOM Elects 65 New Members, Five Foreign Associates - Institute of Medicine. And a quick glance IDs many many microbiologists - I think the fraction is going up. Among the new members:
Claire Pomeroy, from UC Davis (see above).
Claire Fraser-Liggett, of U. of Maryland. I note I used to work at a place, TIGR, some of you may have heard of back in the day. This place was run by Claire F-L. Now I work at a place where some parts (I have a 50% appointment in the medical school) are run by Claire P. Seems I have a thing for working at places with microbiologists name Claire in positions of power.
David Relman, microbiomologist from Stanford.
Martin Blaser, another microbiomologist.
Patricia Conrad, parasitologist/microbiologist at UC Davis.
Paul Offit, immunologist.
And others. I know - I am of course biased. But everywhere I look, from the science section(s) of the New York Times, to articles and news and stories all around, microbes seem to be creeping in more and more. And that is a good thing.
