$$News and Reports$$

Jul. 01, 2015
 Pardo.jpg
 

Pictured above from left to right: BGU President Prof. Rivka Carmi, Dr. Sharon Pardo, BGU Rector Prof. Zvi HaCohen

 

The University recognized excellence in teaching and research on all levels from emeritus and senior faculty to young researchers on Monday during a special ceremony presided over by the Rector Prof. Zvi HaCohen.

Prof. Shmuel Ahituv was lauded for winning this year’s Israel Prize for Bible Studies. the prize committee cited Ahituv for his contribution to the study of the history of the Jewish People in the biblical age and to biblical literary commentary. He deciphered ancient Hebrew inscriptions and presented them in an accessible format used by scholars and students in Israel and around the world.

Professors Ron Dagan and Avishai Henik were promoted to Distinguished Professor. The title is given to professors who have achieved international renown in their field and who continue to conduct original research.

Prof. Avishai Henik is a world-renowned expert in Psychology and Cognitive neuroscience. A former student of Nobel Laureate Prof. Daniel Kahneman, he is one of the founders of the Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience and former Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences. He studies numerical processing, attention, word processing, and synesthesia with the aim to elucidate the basic mental operations and brain structures involved in these processes.

Prof. Ron Dagan is a world renowned physician and researcher in the field of infectious diseases in children and the incumbent of the werner J. and Charlotte A. Gunzburger Chair for the Study of Infectious Diseases. His exceptional contribution in this field has won him both national and international recognition. Prof. Dagan has published over 450 original articles, reviews and book chapters and has presented more than 400 papers in national and international scientific conferences.

He established a national advisory and treatment system for infectious diseases in children. He continues to contribute to developing and investigating vaccines and creating programs that greatly enhance the introduction of new vaccinations for routine use in Israel, as part of the nationally funded "basket of medications".  He has concentrated his energies on a vaccine for Hepatitis A, a vaccine for Rotavirus and another for pneumococcus bacteria. He also has played an enormous role in better understanding and overcoming the antibiotic-resistant bacteria that cause infections in the respiratory and digestive tracts in children. For the past 25 years Prof. Dagan has headed Soroka’s Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit.

Prof. Iris Shai was awarded the Prize for Excellence in Nutrition Research, a unique prize created to honor Joyce Sillins on the occasion of her 75th birthday. Shai, the incumbent of the Dr. Herman Kessel Chair in Epidemiology, conducts groundbreaking research on the effect of various diets.

Dean of the Faculty of Engineering Sciences, Prof. Joseph Kost, was recognized for his election as a member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities.

 

The Toronto Prize for Excellence in Research was created by the Toronto Chapter of the Canadian Associates of BGU in 1998, to support promising young researchers at BGU and encourage them to excel. 

Every year, each faculty submits their best candidates and a committee headed by the Vice President and Dean of Research and Development then selects the researchers whom they feel are most worthy of this honor. Recipients this year hailed from a variety of exciting and pioneering fields. Each young researcher embodies great scientific promise and has already made remarkable progress in his work. 

The recipients were:

Dr. Ilan Dinstein of the Department of Psychology
Dr. Dinstein's research focuses on autism, investigating various aspects of brain function and brain memory in autism and collaborating with scientists at Carnegie Mellon U, NYU and UCSD. He is a major force behind the new autism research center which he established with clinical partners at Soroka University Medical Center.

Dr. Olga Kagan of the Conrad and Chinita Abrahams-Curiel Department of Foreign Literatures and Linguistics
Dr. Kagan is an expert in semantics, combining traditional grammar and theoretical linguistics. She has already published two books as well as articles in leading journals in the field.

Dr. Dan Levy of the Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Genetics
Dr. Levy, incumbent of the Alice and Seymour Powers Career Development Chair in Basic and Clinical Oncology, is an expert in Epigenetics and Chromatin – a new field in molecular biology that enhances our understanding of gene expression. Epigenetics identifies protein-mediated changes that enable/inhibit the binding of transcription factor to the DNA encoding for specific genes – to enable/inhibit their expression. He has introduced this new field to the department, as he is the first researcher to focus on this area at BGU. He has succeeded in obtaining research grants from ISF, BSF, GIF and ICRF.

Dr. Niv Papo of the Avram and Stella Goldstein-Goren Department of Biotechnology Engineering
Dr. Papo, incumbent of the Edgar de Picciotto Career Development Chair in Cancer Therapeutics and Imaging, focuses on the field of protein engineering. His combination of protein engineering, peptide chemistry and in vivo cancer studies distinguishes him as an exceptionally accomplished scientist and promising independent investigator.

Dr. Natalie Elia of the Department of Life Sciences
Dr. Elia is an expert in cutting-edge microscopy technologies, in particular super-resolution fluorescence microscopy. Her work addressing the involvement of ESCRT machinery in cell division was published in several top journals.

Prof. Taleb Mokari of the Department of Chemistry
Prof. Mokari's PhD work in nanoscience and nanotechnology yielded four patents and 24 publications in top scientific journals. He is now considered one of the leading young leaders of nanomaterials synthesis worldwide.

The Roth and Glatt Teaching Prizes were awarded to twenty four faculty members based on the results of this year’s teaching survey.

The recipients included faculty from the following faculties:

Faculty of Natural Sciences

Prof. Paz Carmi
Prof. Oleg Krichevsky
Dr. Daniel Markiewicz
Dr. Avi Goren 

Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

Prof. Nirit Ben-Aryeh Debby
Dr. Naama Atzaba-Poria
Dr. Yariv Feniger
Dr. Itai Kloog
Dr. Sharon Pardo
Dr. Dorit Segal–Engelchin
Dr. Guy Rofe 

Guilford Glazer Faculty of Business and Management

Prof. Miki Malul
Prof. Guy Ben-Porat
Dr. Tamar Icekson 

Faculty of Engineering Sciences

Prof. Asher Brenner
Prof. Moshe Schwartz
Prof Yaniv Gelbstein
Prof. David Fuks
Mr. Yaakov Ben Moshe 

Faculty of Health Sciences

Dr. Gal Yom Tov
Dr. Chen Kugel
Dr. Eli Lewis
Dr. Dagan Schwartz
Mr. Yoav Gimon

 

 Iris.jpg
 

Pictured above from left to right: BGU Rector Prof. Zvi HaCohen, Prof. Iris Shai, BGU President Prof. Rivka Carmi, Vice-President and Dean for Research & Development Prof. Dan Blumberg