by Leigh Ann Gardner (Senior Grants Manager)
April is Arab American Heritage Month, which celebrates the achievements of Arab Americans in diplomacy, science, technology, art, and culture. You can learn more about this here and here.
April 4: On April 4, 2018, the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) named Dina Katabi of MIT as the recipient of the 2017 ACM Prize in Computing for her contributions to wireless systems. Born in Damascus, Syria, she received her undergraduate degree in electrical engineering from the University of Damascus. She then attended MIT, where she received both an MS in Computer Science and a PhD in Computer Systems Networking and Telecommunications. She is a professor at MIT and a co-director of the MIT Center for Wireless Networks and Mobile Computing. Her ACM Prize announcement noted that she and her research team have worked on overcoming interference in wireless networks to better increase data traffic. She has pioneered the use of wireless signals that can detect humans behind walls, determine their movements and surmise their emotional states. In 2016, she co-founded Emerald Innovations, a company that focuses on non-invasive health monitoring. She and her researchers developed the first WiFi-like box which analyzes surrounding radio signals by using neural networks to infer heart rate, movements, breathing, sleep apnea, and sleep stages, which is all done without the human wearing any sensors. She is a 2013 recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship. You can learn more about her and her research here, here and here.
April 10: On April 10, 2008, Dr. Elias Zerhouni, then-director of the NIH, received the French National Order of the Legion of Honor, France’s highest honor, for his work in fostering collaboration between NIH and the Pasteur Institute. Born in Algeria in 1951, he received his MD from the University of Algier School of Medicine. He then immigrated to the United States to study radiology at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. His research focused on radiation therapy, and he is credited for co-inventing a breast biopsy method for diagnosing breast cancer. He is also credited with pioneering magnetic tagging, which is a non-invasive way of using MRI to track the motions of the heart. In 2002, he was named the 15th NIH Director, a role in which he served until October 2008. While NIH Director, he launched an initiative, The NIH Roadmap for Medical Research, a vision to accelerate medical discovery. He also launched an initiative to address the increase in obesity, calling for interdisciplinary research to bridge the study of the behavioral and environmental causes of obesity with the genetic and biological causes of obesity. You can learn more about him here and here.
April 16: Dr. Rachid Yazami, known for his work in developing the graphite anode for lithium-ion batteries, was born on April 16, 1953, in Fez, Morocco. He received both his engineering degree and his PhD from the Grenoble Institute of Technology. In 1980 he invented the lithium graphite anode, which is used in lithium-ion batteries. He holds more than 70 patents related to battery technology, and has co-authored more than 250 papers on batteries, their materials, and their systems. He has also researched fluoride ion batteries and developed a new technique which can be used to assess a battery’s state of health, level of charge, and state of safety. Over the course of his career, he has served as research director at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), as a visiting associate at the California Institute of Technology, and as a professor at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He received the Draper Prize in 2014 from the National Academy of Engineering and was created a Chevalier de la Legion of Honor of France in 2016. Although inventors of the lithium-ion battery received the 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Yazami was not included on the award, which was limited to three recipients. You can learn more about his work here. You can read an article about his omission from the Nobel Prize here.
April 23: On April 23, 2008, Dr. Michael DeBakey, renowned cardiovascular surgeon whose career spanned more than 70 years, received the Congressional Gold Medal for his contributions to medicine. Born in 1908 in Louisiana to Lebanese immigrants, he completed an undergraduate degree in two years at Tulane University, and he entered the Tulane School of Medicine in 1928. While in medical school, DeBakey created a roller pump used for blood transfusions which became an important component of heart-lung machines. After receiving his MD in 1932, he earned a master’s degree and researched stomach ulcers. He received additional surgical training at both the University of Strasbourg and at Heidelberg University. During World War II he served in the Surgical Consultants Division of the Army Surgeon General’s Office and worked to improve surgical services. In 1948 he went to Baylor University College of Medicine to serve as head of the department of surgery. While there, he set up a surgical residency program, established surgical research labs, and eventually served as CEO of the Texas Medical Center. In 1952, he and Denton Cooley were the first Americans to successfully repair an abdominal aortic aneurysm. In 1964, he performed the first successful coronary bypass surgery and in 1968 he performed the first successful multiple-organ transplant. He continued to perform surgery until he was 90 and estimated that he performed more than 60,000 surgeries over the course of his career. He died in 2008. You can learn more about his many achievements here and here.