Cox
By Tony Fitzpatrick
March 2, 2001
Four University scientists - Jerome R. Cox Jr., Christopher I. Byrnes, Dennis W. Choi and Jonathan Losos - will be honored by the Academy of Science of St. Louis at an April 5 dinner at the University of Missouri-St. Louis (UMSL) Millennium Student Center.
Cox |
Jerome R. Cox Jr., Sc.D., senior professor in computer science, and Robert W. Murray, Ph.D., Curators' Professor Emeritus in the chemistry department at UMSL, will share the Peter H. Raven Lifetime Award. The award is given to established scientists to honor a distinguished career.
Cox led research that contributed to developing high-speed Internet switches, digital computers that measure hearing and other computer and medical devices. As computer science chair from 1984-91, he was instrumental in building a department that has an international reputation for networking and switching expertise.
For more than 40 years, Cox has been a leader in developing computer communications, computer imaging and the application of advanced technology to practical biomedical problems. His early research at the Central Institute for the Deaf brought together acoustics, physics and electrical engineering technology on several collaborative projects.
Cox's innovations were instrumental in developing early heart monitors and early laboratory computers dedicated to biomedical solutions and made in the United States.
In 1988, Cox and Washington University collaborators designed and developed a high-speed switching technology used in an experimental network linking two Southwestern Bell offices and the University's Hilltop and Medical campuses. In the late 1990's, Cox and Jonathan S. Turner, Ph.D., Henry Edwin Sever Professor of Engineering, and Guru Parulkar, Ph.D., professor of computer science, launched Growth Networks, a company that applied high-speed switching techniques for networks like the Internet. In March 2000, Growth Networks was purchased by Cisco Systems.
Two University professors will receive Fellows Awards, which honor scientists who excel in teaching and communicating science to colleagues, future researchers and the public.
 Byrnes |
This year's winners are Christopher I. Byrnes, Ph.D., the first Edward H. and Florence G. Skinner Professor in Systems Science and dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science, and Dennis W. Choi, M.D., Ph.D., Andrew B. and Gretchen P. Jones Professor of Neurology and head of the Department of Neurology in the School of Medicine. Choi also is director of the Center for the Study of Nervous System Injury and neurologist-in-chief at Barnes-Jewish Hospital.
Byrnes is internationally known for his research in systems science. He is renowned for his mathematical analysis of linear and nonlinear systems. The unification of linear and nonlinear control theory impacts fields such as aerospace, electrical power systems, signal speech processing and speech synthesis. Byrnes has greatly expanded the school of engineering's scope to include biomedical engineering, in conjunction with the School of Medicine, environmental engineering and computer engineering.
Byrnes is very active in the St. Louis community. He chairs the Technology Gateway Alliance of the Regional Chamber and Growth Association (RCGA) and the Center for Emerging Technologies, which has been influential in business start-ups. He also is a trustee of the Academy of Science of St. Louis.
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Choi is recognized as one the nation's most accomplished physicians/neuroscientists. He has pioneered work in the field of neurodegeneration, which focuses on molecular mechanisms that cause nerve cell death. His research illustrates how brain-signaling pathways can damage tissue, as during stroke, head trauma or epilepsy. His work is opening new insights into the development of new therapies for brain and spinal cord injuries and repair.
Jonathan Losos, Ph.D., is associate professor of biology in Arts & Sciences and director of the University's Tyson Research Center. He will receive the Innovation Award, given to a scientist under age 40 "for superior accomplishment in a branch of science."
Losos has developed new models for studying evolutionary biology, focusing on the evolutionary diversification of lizards.
Losos' goal is to understand biological diversity. He combines different analytical approaches and experimental methods and has facilitated new understandings of how evolution works.
 Losos |
Losos has shown that species can adapt and evolve quickly, given strong natural selection. This contrasts sharply to the widely held notion that evolution is gradual. He reconstructs phylogenies --biological families --by sequencing the DNA of different lizard species to understand their evolutionary relationships. Then he develops a model case study to test evolutionary hypotheses directly with experiments.
Collaborative work with Allan Larson, Ph.D., professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, and students and postdoctoral fellows has involved the use of DNA sequence data to reconstruct the evolutionary relationships of lizard species.
These studies have established Caribbean anolis lizards as a model system for evolutionary analysis. Experimental and observational field studies have complemented this work and provided an understanding of these species' ecology.
A panel of scientists from the St. Louis academic and business communities selected the honorees for their achievements.
For dinner reservations, call 533-8083.
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