September 27, 1999

4 COLLECT HIGUCHI AWARDS

LAWRENCE -- Three University of Kansas professors and a Kansas State University professor are the recipients of the 1999 Higuchi/Endowment Research Achievement Awards.

Winners, who receive $10,000 each to further their research, will be honored at a ceremony Oct. 7 in the Bruckmiller Room at the Adams Alumni Center. The professors are:

• Rex Martin, KU professor of philosophy, who received the Balfour S. Jeffrey Award for research achievement in the humanities and social sciences;
• Tyrone Duncan, KU professor of mathematics, who received the Olin K. Petefish Award for research achievement in the basic sciences;
• Sudhansu Dey, professor of molecular and integrative physiology at the KU Medical Center, who received the Dolph Simons Award for research achievement in the biomedical sciences; and
• Jan Leach, distinguished professor of plant pathology at K-State, who received the Irvin E. Youngberg Award for research achievement in the applied sciences.

The awards were established in 1981 by Takeru Higuchi, university regents distinguished professor of pharmaceutical chemistry and chemistry, and his wife, Aya Higuchi. The Higuchis creatednamed the awards to recognize contributions to the research programs at all Kansas Board of Regents institutions.

Martin came to teach at KU in 1968 and served as chair of the philosophy department from 1972 to 1978. His research has been in the areas of political and legal philosophy, history of political theory and philosophy of history, including most recently a book, "System of Rights," and an edition of R.G. Collingwood's "Essay on Metaphysics." He has been recognized with a number of honors and awards, including Fulbright, NEH and Rockefeller Research Fellowships and visiting appointments at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, and most recently at St Catherine's College, Oxford.

Duncan has been teaching at KU since 1974. He received his doctoral and master's degrees from Stanford University and was named a visiting scholar and research fellow in Harvard University's Division of Applied Sciences. He has also held visiting positions at the University of California-Berkeley and the University of Bonn in Germany.

Dey, who received his Ph.D. from the University of Calcutta, India, is recognized internationally for his studies of reproductive biology and the processes of embryo implantation and is considered a leader in the field of implantation and early embryonic development. He has received the KU Chancellor's Club Research Award, the KU Medical Center's Senior Investigator Award and an NIH Merit Award for his contribution to implantation biology.

Early in her career at K-State, Leach pioneered studies on a model host-pathogen interaction system of a bacterial pathogen that causes bacterial disease in rice. She is a university distinguished professor at Kansas State, a fellow of the American Phytopathology Society, editor-in-chief of the international journal Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions and president of the International Society of Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions.

Contact: Bunny Smith, (785) 864-8860.