Photo Credit: Johns Hopkins Photographer, Keith Weller/JHM.

Dr. Peter Agre has spent his career researching the molecular aspects of human diseases, including hemolytic anemias, blood group antigens, and malaria. In 2003, he received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Roderick MacKinnon of Rockefeller University for the discovery of aquaporins, water channels that facilitate the movement of water across cell membranes.

Dr. Agre is a Bloomberg Distinguished Professor with appointments in the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and the Department of Molecular Biology and Immunology at Bloomberg School of Public Health. He is the director of the Malaria Research Institute and a professor of biological chemistry. Dr. Agre received his undergraduate degree in chemistry from Augsburg College and his medical degree from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He completed his residency in internal medicine at Case Western Reserve University Hospitals of Cleveland and his hematology-oncology fellowship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Agre returned to Johns Hopkins as a postdoctoral fellow in cell biology before joining the faculty in 1984. In 2005, he became vice chancellor for science and technology at Duke University Medical Center and returned to Johns Hopkins in 2008.

Dr. Agre is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. He has served as the president of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences. Dr. Agre has received honorary doctorates from universities in Denmark, Japan, Norway, Greece, Mexico, Hungary, Poland, and the United States.

Dr. Pamela Lipsett is a renown surgeon, educator, and researcher at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine where she was the first woman to become a professor of surgery. Her research focuses on improving outcomes for critically ill patients, including infection prevention, antibiotic management, and hand hygiene. Dr. Lipsett’s work has been published in many medical journals and she has played a key role in many clinical trials, government-supported grants, and investigator-initiated studies. She has served as an invaluable mentor to undergraduates, research and postdoctoral fellows, residents, medical students and nurses.

Dr. Lipsett is currently the Warfield M. Firor Endowed Professor in Surgery at Johns Hopkins and serves as professor of surgery and nursing, and assistant professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine. She is the co-director of the surgical intensive care units and director of the Surgical Critical Care Fellowship Program. Dr. Lipsett earned her medical degree from the University of Massachusetts Medical School and completed her general surgery residency at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. She has spent her entire career at Johns Hopkins. Dr Lipsett has served in leadership positions as president of both the Society of Critical Care Medicine and the Surgical Infection Society.

Dr. Neil Powe has made fundamental contributions in biology, clinical epidemiology, health services and equity, and patient outcomes. His research unites medicine and public health to improve health and save lives. He has a particular interest in cultivating young scientists who are addressing major problems in science, health, and health care delivery. Dr. Powe joined the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine faculty in 1986 and became the first Black full professor in the Department of Medicine.

Dr. Powe serves as leader of the University of California San Francisco Medicine Department of Medicine at the Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital. He received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University and his medical degree from Harvard Medical School. He received his M.P.H. from the Harvard School of Public Health and M.B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania. At Johns Hopkins, he became the director of the Welch Center for Prevention, Epidemiology and Clinical Research, and was the founding director of the School of Medicine’s Predoctoral Clinical Research Training Program, the Clinical Research Scholars Program, and the Johns Hopkins Evidence-Based Practice Center—programs that started in 2004, 2005 and 1997 respectively, and continue today. 

Dr. Selwyn Vickers is an internationally recognized pancreatic cancer surgeon, pancreatic cancer researcher, and pioneer in health disparities research. He became the first full-time Black faculty member at the University of Alabama Birmingham School of Medicine in the Department of Surgery and the first Black faculty member there to hold an endowed chair position.

Dr. Vickers is the president and CEO of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. He received his undergraduate degree from Johns Hopkins University and completed his medical degree and surgical training at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He completed two post-graduate research fellowships with the National Institutes of Health and international surgical training at John Radcliffe Hospital in the United Kingdom. He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and the Johns Hopkins Society of Scholars; past president of the American Surgical Association, Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract, and the Southern Surgical Association; and has served on the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Board of Trustees and the Johns Hopkins University Board of Trustees.

Dr. Bert Vogelstein is a pioneer in cancer genetics whose work set the paradigm for modern cancer research. He was the first scientist to elucidate the molecular basis of a common human cancer.

Dr. Vogelstein is the co-director of the Ludwig Center at the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center and the Clayton Professor of Oncology and Pathology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine with joint appointments in molecular biology and genetics. He is also an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Dr. Vogelstein earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Pennsylvania, where he graduated summa cum laude with distinction in mathematics, and his medical degree from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, before completing an internship and residency in pediatrics at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Following his clinical training, Dr. Vogelstein completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Cancer Institute with a focus in molecular biology. He has received numerous awards for his groundbreaking work. His work has been cited more than any other physician-scientist in history except Sigmund Freud.

Dr. Sarah Hanson has spent her career leading clinical capacity-building projects for women's health care around the world. Internationally, she has worked with Doctors Without Borders, the World Health Organization, and Jhpiego throughout the continent of Africa, Central America, Southeast Asia, and the Indian Subcontinent. Dr. Hanson worked for over a decade with the Indian Health Service in the United States on the Navajo reservation and at The Alaskan Native Medical Center, helping to found Alaska's statewide perinatal quality programs including simulation and education outreach.

Dr. Hanson is currently an instructor at Harvard Medical School and the site director for the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) global health program in obstetrics and gynecology, in collaboration with the Botswana-Harvard Partnership. She is the residency program director for the Ob/Gynae program at the University of Botswana, and just graduated the country's first class of in-country trainees last year. She graduated from the Medical College of Virginia and completed her residency at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. She lives full-time in southern Africa with her husband and four children.

Dr. Cwik has devoted her career to developing, promoting, and scaling public health innovations to prevent youth suicide in communities suffering the highest inequities in the U.S., such as the American Indian and Alaska Native populations. Her work has included developing, implementing, and evaluating the first tribally mandated suicide surveillance and case management system for the White Mountain Apache Tribe. Her results, published in the American Journal of Public Health, showed this prevention system resulted in a 38% reduction in suicide deaths and a 53% reduction in suicide attempts. For this contribution, her team has received recognition from the Indian Health Service and American Academy of Child Psychiatry and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Dr. Cwik has received grant funding, including a “high impact” investment from the Bloomberg School of Public Health’s American Health Initiative, to scale the suicide prevention program to more tribal communities across the U.S.

Dr. Cwik is associate director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Indigenous Health and senior scientist in the Department of International Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. In addition, she provides senior consultation to the State of Maryland and national agencies on regional and national suicide prevention. She completed her post-doctoral training in youth suicide prevention at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in the Department of Psychiatry.

Dr. Bruce Fye has had a remarkable three-part career as an internationally recognized cardiologist, historian of medicine, and medical bibliophile. He holds three degrees from Johns Hopkins, including an A.B. and M.D., and an M.A. in the History of Medicine. He also did a fellowship in cardiology at Johns Hopkins where he was a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar.

In 1978, Dr. Fye joined the Marshfield Clinic (Wisconsin) where he founded the echocardiography laboratory and served as chair of the cardiology department for 18 years. From 2000 until his retirement in 2014, he was a cardiologist and professor of medicine and the history of medicine at Mayo Clinic. He has published 3 books and more than 100 historical and biographical papers. Dr. Fye has been president of the American College of Cardiology, the American Osler Society, and the American Association for the History of Medicine, which awarded him the Welch Medal for best book and its Lifetime Achievement Award. A medical book collector since his days at Johns Hopkins, Dr. Fye has donated 15,000 medical books to Mayo Clinic and has donated what was considered to be the best private collection of cardiovascular books to the Huntington Library.

Dr. Laman Gray Jr. is an internationally recognized leader in cardiac surgery and the development of artificial hearts and circulatory support systems. Dr. Gray’s outstanding accomplishments include performing the first heart transplant in Kentucky, in 1984, and the first bridge-to-heart transplant after the use of a Thoratec Biventricular Assist Device in the United States. He was also an original investigator for the Novacor Ventricular Assist Device System. In 1992, Dr. Gray performed the first clinical use of Abiomed’s SupraCor intra-aortic balloon pump and was one of the four primary clinical investigators that brought Abiomed’s BVS 5000 temporary cardiac support system to clinical approval by the FDA. Additionally, Dr. Gray and his surgical team implanted the first AbioCor total implantable artificial heart into a patient. He was consultant for the Food and Drug Administration to the Circulatory System Devices Panel of the Medical Devices Advisory Committee, Center for Devices and Radiology.

Dr. Gray was professor of surgery at the University of Louisville School of Medicine, director of the Division of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, and Jewish Hospital distinguished chair in cardiothoracic surgery. He was a member of the Jewish Hospital board of trustees and a founding member of the Jewish Hospital Heart and Lung Institute. After being director of the Division of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, he became the executive and medical director of the Cardiovascular Innovation Institute. During that time, he raised approximately $80 million dollars in philanthropy for the institute and has received multiple awards.

Dr. Jane Oski is a staff pediatrician at the Tuba City Regional Health Care Corporation and Sacred Peaks Health Center, and an adjunct clinical instructor in pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Oski joined the Tuba City Regional Health Care Corporation in 1998 as a staff pediatrician in the Tuba City Indian Medical Center before becoming director of the center’s adolescent health services program. She fostered public health initiatives and led innovative efforts and dedicated advocacy on behalf of Native American children. She currently serves as chair of the Indian Health Special Interest Group for the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Native American Child Health, member of the Arizona Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics Vaccines for Children Committee, chair of the Tuba City Regional Health Care Infection Prevention Committee, and co-chair of the Tuba City Regional Health Care Epidemic Response Team. 

In 2017, for her work in fostering public health initiatives and her impact on Native American adolescents, Dr. Oski was awarded the Community Hero Award from the Johns Hopkins University Alumni Association—an award recognizing outstanding contributions that address critical social, economic, and environmental needs throughout our society and communities. She has published over nine works, two texts, and two book chapters, and has previously served on the editorial boards of The Journal of Pediatrics, Contemporary Pediatrics, and the Physicians for DHA Newsletter.

Dr. Shelly Choo is a public servant and champion for Maryland families. Her thoughtful, evidence-based approaches have improved community access to resources and knowledge. During her time as senior medical advisor for the B’More Healthy Babies Initiative, Dr. Choo led infant sleep training sessions and managed provider outreach efforts to ensure clinicians caring for families and babies in the area had access to resources. These efforts contributed to a 32% decline in infant death in Baltimore City. As chief medical officer for the Baltimore City Health Department, Dr. Choo led multiple population health initiatives such as the Accountable Health Communities Initiatives and the Levels of Care for Baltimore City Hospitals to Respond to the Opioid Epidemic. 

Dr. Choo is currently the director of the Bureau of Maternal and Child Health at the Maryland Department of Health. In this role, her expertise and vision can extend to families across Maryland where she manages multiple essential services such as the Maryland Title V program, Family Planning, Women Infant and Children initiatives, and home visiting. Through her time, she has focused on expanding essential services such as group-based prenatal care called CenteringPregnancy and home visiting as well as partnering with community-based organizations.

Dr. Ralph Hruban has been a member of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine faculty since 1990 and is currently the ninth Baxley Professor and Director of the Department of Pathology. He has served as director of the Johns Hopkins Sol Goldman Pancreatic Cancer Research Center since its inception in 2005.

Under Dr. Hruban’s leadership, the Johns Hopkins Department of Pathology has flourished. It has been ranked first in NIH funding among all pathology departments in the United States for 15 of the last 17 years. The department’s residency training program is also recognized as one of the best in the country, and eight new professorship endowment funds have been established. 

Home to an award-winning diversity program, the department’s clinical excellence touches almost all departments across Johns Hopkins. Dr. Hruban has taken an award-winning collaborative approach to his pancreatic cancer research. In a career spanning more than four decades, Dr. Hruban has received numerous awards for his work and has written and edited 12 books. His most recent book, A Scientific Revolution: Ten Men and Women Who Reinvented American Medicine, celebrates the history of the medical school. He was a two-term member of the Johns Hopkins Alumni Council and president of the Johns Hopkins Medicine Alumni Association. 

Dr. Sol Snyder is the father of molecular pharmacology and molecular neuroscience. His nearly six-decade tenure at Johns Hopkins has been filled with remarkable discoveries and accomplishments. Dr. Snyder founded the Department of Neuroscience at Johns Hopkins, one of the first in the nation, which he led until 2006. He is recognized as a truly exceptional mentor who has guided medical students, graduate students, post-doctoral trainees, and innumerable faculty in the School of Medicine to become leaders in their fields.

Dr. Snyder is one of the most highly cited scientists in biology and biomedical sciences. Together, his discoveries have unraveled many mysteries of how the brain works, and they led to the development of medications for a wide variety of conditions. Working with his Johns Hopkins colleagues, Dr. Snyder devised the reversible ligand-binding process known as the “grind-and-bind” technique. He used this technique to identify many of the major neurotransmitters in the brain, including the revolutionary discovery of endogenous opiate receptors, for which he won the 1978 Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research. Dr. Snyder also identified and defined the pharmacology of the GABA receptor, where the drug diazepam attaches; the adenosine receptor, which caffeine blocks to cause mental stimulation; the bradykinin receptor, which transmits pain; and the dopamine receptor, to which antipsychotic drugs attach. Dr. Snyder and his research team also discovered that gases can serve as neural messengers.

In 2003 Sol was awarded the National Medal of Science, the nation’s highest scientific honor.

Dr. Pablo Celnik is a physiatrist, physician-scientist, and leader in rehabilitation and academic medicine. For 20 years, he served on the Johns Hopkins faculty in roles including physiatrist-in-chief and chair of the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, director of the Human Brain Physiology Lab, director of the Precision Medicine Center of Excellence in Rehabilitation, and co-director of the Sheikh Khalifa Stroke Institute. During his tenure, Dr. Celnik achieved transformational growth, expanding Johns Hopkins’ local and global rehabilitation footprint, scientific funding, and philanthropic contributions.

At Hopkins, Dr. Celnik served as co-chair of the Youth Mentoring Task Force and co-chair of the task force exploring ways to recognize diversity, equity, and inclusion during the academic promotion process. Dr. Celnik was the executive sponsor of Johns Hopkins La Familia and chair of the Faculty Diversity Council.

Dr. Celnik has published more than 130 manuscripts in peer-reviewed journals and has received numerous prestigious awards. He has served on many boards, including the Medical Board of the Johns Hopkins Hospital and the Advisory Board of Medical Faculty at the School of Medicine.

Dr. Celnik is currently CEO of Shirley Ryan AbilityLab. A native of Argentina, he received his medical degree from the University of Buenos Aires Faculty of Medical Sciences. He completed his residency training in neurology in Argentina and a fellowship in neurological rehabilitation at the University of Maryland. He also completed two research fellowships at the NIH’s National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. In 2000, he entered the PM&R residency program at Johns Hopkins.