21 faculty, staff receive SUNY Chancellor’s Awards

Ten faculty members, one librarian and 10 staff members have been named recipients of the 2020 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence.

The Chancellor’s Awards acknowledge and provide system-wide recognition for consistently superior professional achievement and encourage the ongoing pursuit of excellence.

The Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities recognizes the work of those who engage actively in scholarly and creative pursuits beyond their teaching responsibilities. Recipients are Qing Lin, professor, Department of Chemistry; Sandra Murray, professor, Department of Psychology; Sanjay Sethi, professor and chief of pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine, Department of Medicine; Andrew Talal, professor, Department of Medicine; and Brian Tsuji, professor, Department of Pharmacy Practice.

The Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching honors those who consistently demonstrate superb teaching at the undergraduate, graduate or professional level. Recipients are Timothy Cook, associate professor, Department of Chemistry; Johannes Hachmann, associate professor, Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering; Kwang Oh, professor, Department of Electrical Engineering; and Wendy Quinton, clinical associate professor, Department of Psychology.

The Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Faculty Service recognizes “the consistently superior service contributions of teaching faculty” sustained over a period of time. This year’s recipient is Steven Dubovsky, professor and chair, Department of Psychiatry.

The Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Librarianship recognizes “skill in librarianship; service to the campus, the university and to the field; scholarship and professional growth; and major professional achievements.” The recipient is Frederick Stoss, librarian, University Libraries.

The Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Professional Service honors professional staff performance excellence “both within and beyond the position.” Recipients are Cheryl Bailey, associate director, Campus Planning; Dusti Dean, business administrator and assistant to the chair, Department of Music; Jeff Dunbar, director of technology transfer, Research and Economic Development; Rebecca Farnham, creative director/art director, University Communications; Phyllis Floro, director, Student Engagement; Ryan McPherson, chief sustainability officer; Sharon Mitchell, senior director, Student Wellness, and director, Counseling Services; and Elizabeth O’Brocta, assistant to the chair, Department of Biochemistry.

The Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Classified Service recognizes classified staff members who have consistently demonstrated superlative performance within and beyond their position. This year’s recipients are Wendy Hicks, supervisor, Campus Mail Services, and Catherine Swiech, administrative assistant to the dean, College of Arts and Sciences.

Cheryl Bailey, associate director in University Facilities’ Office of Campus Planning since 2001, has played a significant role in the UB 2020 physical master plan and in the SUNY-wide facilities master plan. Her expertise has been tapped for numerous large build-out projects on both the North and South campuses, as well as to help reinvent UB’s learning landscape.

She helps create and implement policies related to classroom utilization and standards, design, modernizing multimedia technologies and classroom maintenance. She also develops guiding principles for instructional space.

As the lead planner for UB’s annual campus classroom assessment and rehabilitation process, Bailey’s efforts have led to significant improvements to teaching spaces, providing faculty with cutting-edge classroom technology that enhances student learning. In an effort to streamline these projects and create a more efficient and sustainable process, she developed most of the related forms and templates, and moved the renovation and space request forms to an online portal.

Among the renovation projects Bailey has been involved in are upgrades to the English composition writing labs and the upcoming renovation of science classrooms in the Natural Sciences Complex.

She also led a collaboration between University Facilities and University Communications to develop environmental guidelines for physical spaces based on the UB brand.

Timothy Cook’s colleagues in the Department of Chemistry describe him as an “extraordinarily talented and dedicated teacher” whose “lively demeanor in the classroom captivates his students, drawing large crowds and amounting to department-wide popularity.”

Cook teaches a broad range of courses in general and inorganic chemistry at the graduate and undergraduate levels, and has consistently received high praise for his instruction in the classroom and the laboratory. Students describe him as an incredible professor — “absolutely one of the best,” one student wrote — and he has consistently received outstanding course evaluations, with an average score exceeding 4.9 out of 5.0.

He is dedicated to helping guide the next generation of chemists, mentoring numerous undergraduate, graduate and postdoctoral research students. In his relatively short time at UB — he joined the faculty in 2014 — he has already mentored two postdoctoral researchers, four PhD graduates, 11 bachelor’s graduates, three visiting undergraduate research students and two visiting scholars. His research group consists of eight students in UB’s PhD program. In addition to directly advising these students, he has served on the PhD committees of 53 graduate students.

Cook also serves as a co-principal investigator on a National Science Foundation-funded Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) grant that provides summer research internships for 10 visiting undergraduates in the chemistry department.

A 13-year member of the Department of Music, Dusti Dean assumes a wide range of responsibilities in her roles as assistant to the chair and business manager, including budgeting, personnel appointments, office operations, search committees, emergency preparedness and interdepartmental coordination, as well as handling a “challenging amount of contracts, payments and revenues” associated with the numerous artists and lecturers involved in departmental concerts and festivals.

Faculty describe Dean as “tireless” in keeping the department running smoothly and solving any problems that arise, and praise her for “caring for our building (Baird Hall) like it was her own and tending to the needs of the faculty like they are her family.”

She was cited in particular for her response to two instances of flooding in Baird in recent years, as well as her quick and professional work in addressing some offensive graffiti in buildings used by the department.

Colleagues also praise her for her capable and caring response to students who come to her in times of crisis or concern, noting that Dean always listens to students’ concerns and ensures they are able to access the resources available to them at UB.

A UB faculty member and chair of the Department of Psychiatry since 2004, Steven Dubovsky is an accomplished scholar who has provided dedicated service to his institution and profession, as well as expert leadership and managerial skills to the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, and to UB.

Dubovsky’s “extensive and generous” service to his school includes past roles as president of the UBMD Management Council and chair of the Promotions Criteria Revision Committee, the Practice Plan Reorganization Committee and the Great Lakes Consolidation Committee for Psychiatry, and current positions as chair of the School of Medicine Conflict of Interest Committee and member of the UBA Executive Committee and the Legal Committee for the Optimum Physicians Alliance.

In the broader psychiatric community, he implemented an annual Comprehensive Review of Psychiatry in 2005 that continues today to attract regional, national and international practitioners. In 2006, he was a founding member of the board of directors for ProtectNY, an academic and professional society devoted to safeguarding the state from terrorism and natural disasters. Dubovsky served as the society’s president from 2012-14, and as a member of the Incident Dynamics Group, developed a virtual reality model of an urban hospital emergency department.

An accomplished scholar, Dubovsky serves on the editorial boards of several highly ranked journals, and is principal investigator on 11 industry-sponsored clinical trials. His research has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the pharmaceutical industry and numerous foundations.

In his spare time, he is a volunteer firefighter and a reserve deputy sheriff.

As director of the Office of Technology Transfer since 2005, Jeff Dunbar leads a team to commercialize technology emerging from the research activity conducted at UB to benefit the public good, and to facilitate research and development and clinical trial activity with industry  He also assists startup business development. Numerous startups — including Athenex, now a global pharmaceutical company — have succeeded thanks in part to the support of Dunbar and his office.

Dunbar consistently looks for ways to improve processes. Shortly after arriving at UB, he played a key role in reshaping his office from one in which staff members independently managed projects to a cross-functional structure that enables each team member to bring specialized expertise to each project. He also facilitated introduction of UB SWIFT to streamline the industry-sponsored research process, funding for commercial proof-of-concept awards and an Entrepreneur-in-Residence program funded by the federal Economic Development Administration.

Dunbar was instrumental in developing UB’s Innovation Hub, which was designed to utilize $13.5 million from the Buffalo Billion II investment to create and launch the Buffalo Fund, which aims to accelerate commercialization of early-stage technologies, and formation of Empire Discovery Institute, a not-for-profit drug discovery company funded by a $35.4 million Empire State Development grant.

Rebecca Farnham has earned a reputation as the consummate communications professional, an expert in using visual communications and design to tell UB’s story and reach key audiences. As creative director in University Communications since 2014, she leads a group of graphic designers and photographers responsible for developing and overseeing the university’s visual identity on the web, in social media, in print and digital communications, and in environmental applications, including high-profile university initiatives and events.

Beyond her role within the division, Farnham has worked to develop a more comprehensive and cohesive communications approach across the university, providing expert guidance to help unit communicators shape a more consistent institutional identity and brand.

Farnham, who joined the university as a designer in 1987, has been instrumental in UB’s institutional Identity and Brand Strategy Initiative, leading every facet of the visual expression of the UB brand, from university lockup graphic system refinements to distinctive visual storytelling techniques.

She also has been the creative lead in developing promotional assets for UB’s campaigns across traditional and digital media, helping to heighten the university’s visibility nationally and around the globe.

As director of student engagement since 2015, Phyllis Floro is responsible for the overall management, program development and assessment, and budget of the Student Engagement office, as well as working closely with student clubs and organizations, the Here to Career program, pride and tradition programs, activism on campus, and various opportunities for involvement for students, both on and off campus.

She was tasked with creating a new Office of Student Engagement to meet the changing needs of UB students and support SUNY and UB initiatives related to experiential learning. Colleagues note the unit restructuring came at the same time as a restructuring of a student government, with Floro’s leadership and professionalism making for “a smooth transition and a positive course for the future.”

Floro also demonstrated a willingness to go above and beyond her responsibilities by serving as interim director of Campus Life while also leading Student Engagement — the two units were ultimately combined into one entity with Floro as director.

She is credited with executing the new organizational structure, and making changes to budgets and programming to provide UB students with even more meaningful and relevant experiences.

Floro also consistently supports students during times of crisis, and is a constant and comforting presence during community-wide remembrance events.

Johannes Hachmann is described by peers as a “passionate educator” who has made excellent contributions in research, teaching and service.

He is an innovative instructor and dedicated mentor, held in high regard by his students, who have given him an impressive average score of 4.7 out of 5 on their teaching evaluations over the years.

Hachmann engages his students by challenging them to connect their course material to real-world problem settings, in particular in the areas of modeling and machine learning. He is always available to his students for advice ranging from classroom questions to their professional development and beyond.

He has been the primary adviser of two PhD and 17 MS graduates, and his research group currently includes five PhD students and four MS students.

Hachmann is actively advancing new curricula and learning opportunities for students. He is a major contributor to the cross-disciplinary Computational and Data-Enabled Science and Engineering (CDSE) graduate program that offers a comprehensive curriculum and collaborative research opportunities at the forefront of computational and data science. He is also director of the Engineering Science for Data Science MS program.

In 2015, Hachmann initiated the annual UB Symposium on Job and Career Perspectives for Students in the Computational Sciences, and has been co-organizing the “UB CDSE Days” as well.

He is also the founding faculty adviser for the UB chapter of Engineers without Borders and the Computational Science Club.

Wendy Hicks is lauded by her colleagues in Campus Mail for both embracing change and collaborating with her staff and campus departments “to find ways to work through challenges and ensure service standards are maintained or improved.”

Her supervisor cites Hicks’ ability to problem-solve to meet campus needs in the face of continuous challenges involving departmental moves and campus construction. In particular, Hicks “worked to effectively reroute mail, strategically evaluated delivery routes and initiated mailbox moves” to assist the university’s daily operations.

Consistently going above and beyond to improve the overall service and efficiency of Campus Mail, Hicks has working tirelessly to simplify and enhance processes when asked to oversee both the drivers and sorters within her unit. Working with Campus Living, she led an effort to streamline package delivery notifications to students.

She is praised by her peers for demonstrating “compassion and kindness to each of her employees, as well as the individuals she deals with in multiple departments across campus.”

Widely recognized as a leader in the field of chemical biology, Qing Lin develops biocompatible organic reactions — such as “photoclick” cycloaddition and cross-coupling reactions — that can be used in complex biological media to label membrane receptors in live cells to study cell signaling, as well as modify therapeutic agents to improve their efficacy. His work has produced real-world applications in pharmacology that are routinely applied by research groups around the world in the fields of chemical biology and materials science.

A highly productive scholar, Lin has garnered nearly $7 million in external funding during his career at UB, and has been continuously funded by the NIH since

2009. He is currently principal investigator on three federal grants, including a prestigious $2 million NIH R35 Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award (MIRA).

Since joining the UB faculty in 2005, Lin has published 58 peer-reviewed articles and one book chapter, with 13 of these articles appearing in the Journal of the American Chemical Society and three in the international edition of Angewandte Chemie — arguably the highest-profile journals in chemistry.

Lin has an h-index of 38 per Google Scholar and seven patents to his credit. He is also the founder of Transira Therapeutics, a successful UB spinoff that has been supported by grants from the NIH, Buffalo Fund Accelerator and the SUNY Technology Accelerator fund.

As UB’s inaugural chief sustainability officer since 2011, Ryan McPherson has created a culture of innovative and collaborative sustainability at UB and implemented strategies to help position the university as a sustainability leader in the community, state and nation, as well as across higher education.

Among his chief priorities has been setting 10 key strategies to implement within the next decade as part of the university’s climate action plan. He also has worked to integrate the Sustainable Development Goals across campus and New York as part of the broader work to create the next generation of change agents who are building the future we seek.

In part under McPherson’s oversight, UB has already achieved one of its sustainability goals: 100% of the electricity the university uses comes from clean, renewable sources, an achievement that has helped UB reduce its carbon footprint by 35% and put the university on the path to climate neutrality by 2030.

During McPherson’s tenure, UB has received the Green Power Leadership Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, won Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s “Reforming the Energy Vision” competition, and most recently was rated No. 1 — among 376 colleges and universities — by the Times Higher Education Impact Assessment among U.S. universities in taking urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts.

Sharon Mitchell is praised by colleagues for her professionalism, care for students and quick responses in times of crisis and tragedy.

To meet the needs of the growing numbers of students seeking mental health resources, Mitchell has developed original and impactful solutions. Relying on wellness tools and services beyond traditional counseling, she significantly reduced the wait time for services and expanded appointment availability, offering more than 235 wellness-related sessions last year.

Understanding the unique stress and pressure faced by student-athletes, she collaborated with the Division of Athletics to educate student-athletes, coaches and support staff on wellness and self-care. She went beyond the idea of mandatory counseling sessions to go with a more holistic approach, placing a psychologist within UB Athletics while maintaining a focus on the availability of wellness resources and mental health education across the entire athletics program.

Mitchell has also assisted University Police in times of need and supported the department’s training to ensure officers respond effectively, and compassionately, to students in crisis.

She has shown her professional commitment to her field by serving as president of the Delaware State Board of Examiners of Psychologists and the SUNY Counseling Center Directors. After serving an unprecedented 10 years on the board of directors for the Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors, she currently serves as the group’s president.

Sandra Murray is considered a world-renowed authority on the psychology of intimate or romantic relationships. One colleague notes that in his view, “we can divide relationship science into two eras: before and after Murray’s arrival.”

She has developed theoretical models of relationship dynamics credited with forming a cornerstone in social psychology, and psychology more broadly. One of her most important areas of investigation — described by her peers as a “truly seminal line of research” — examines how people use “motivated cognition” to create, bolster and maintain idealized views of their romantic partners and relationships.

Despite dwindling opportunities for federal research funding in the field of social psychology, Murray’s work has received nearly continuous support during her nearly 25 years at UB, including four grants from the NIH and two from the NSF totaling nearly $3 million.

She has published 50 peer-reviewed articles and 16 book chapters, in addition to authoring two books. With an h-index of 40 per Google Scholar, her publications have appeared in the most prestigious journals of both psychology and the sub-field of social psychology, including Psychological Review, Psychological Bulletin, Psychological Science and the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

She is a fellow of the American Psychological Association, the Society of Experimental Social Psychology, the Society of Personality and Social Psychology, and the Association for Psychological Science.

As assistant to the chair of biochemistry since 2001, Elizabeth O’Brocta oversees all administrative aspects for department personnel, assists in the recruitment and promotion of faculty and staff, manages all student services at the undergraduate and graduate levels, processes international employee and student visas, and organizes and coordinates all administrative, academic and professional activities for the department.

Her deep institutional and professional knowledge — she has been a member of the UB community since 1995 — has been key to her role in faculty searches, and also was critical when the department moved from the South Campus to the Jacobs School’s new building on the downtown campus.

O’Brocta works closely with the directors of undergraduate and graduate education on numerous issues pertaining to program and curricular development, recruitment and student advisement. In particular, she played an important role when the undergraduate program underwent significant revisions, including changes to both major course prerequisites and approved upper-division electives, and the development and implementation of new required courses.

She also has provided significant support in recruiting students to the program by helping create program guides and by participating in open house and freshman orientation programs. She has effectively managed nearly all issues pertaining to student registration, student academic report audits for fulfillment of departmental and university requirements, and financial aid advisement.

Kwang Oh is described by colleagues as a “well-established researcher and experienced educator” who has made outstanding contributions to pedagogy by “constantly introducing innovative teaching methods.”

Oh’s pedagogical philosophy goes well beyond memorization and rote learning, inspiring students to think critically about the broader implications of problems by framing them in the context of real-world situations.

He has taught dozens of undergraduate- and graduate-level courses, and consistently receives high marks on course evaluations from his students — many of whom call him one of the best instructors they’ve ever had.

Oh has reworked required courses to improve the learning experience, and has leveraged federal and industry grants, and collaborated with numerous campus organizations to develop undergraduate and graduate research experiences in his Sensors and Microactuators Learning Lab (SMALL).

Working with UB’s Honors College and the Experiential Learning Network, he established the SMALL Honors Internship Program so that students could expand their course-based learning by designing, fabricating and testing microactuators and microfluidic devices in a world-class research environment. To date, he has worked with 26 undergraduates — including many from underrepresented groups — who have gone on to author papers in peer-reviewed publications and present at international conferences and workshops.

Oh encourages students from underrepresented groups to participate in enrichment programs, and has served as a faculty mentor for several of these programs, including the Collegiate Science and Technology Entry Program (CSTEP) and the Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP).

Wendy Quinton has taught a remarkable 54 courses over the past nine years, ranging from large introductory courses with hundreds of students to honors-level seminars with only a dozen. Yet, colleagues say, the large and varied course load has never affected her ability to mentor and help students engage with the material while maintaining high standards.

Moreover, her mentorship extends beyond students, with many of her peers seeking her help and guidance on teaching methods, student policies and departmental procedures.

In addition to her teaching responsibilities, Quinton has remained active in her scholarly pursuits. Her research concerning the experience of international students on campus and in their host countries has appeared in the Journal of Diversity in Higher Education and the International Journal of Intercultural Relations. She has also presented her research at national conferences held by the Midwestern Psychological Association and the National Institute on the Teaching of Psychology.

Quinton’s in-depth knowledge of educational methods has shaped her pedagogy and attributed greatly to her students’ success, her peers note. She has served as director of the Psychology Honors Program since 2008, shepherding students through both the research and graduate application process. Quinton was awarded the Department of Psychology’s Excellence in Teaching Award for 10 consecutive years — an award based on student votes.

Additionally, she was the student-selected faculty speaker for the 2018 College of Arts and Sciences’ undergraduate commencement ceremony, and was the winner of the 2018 UB Life Raft Debate, where she successfully argued to a student audience that psychology is the discipline most needed when starting a new society.

A nationally and internationally recognized expert in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), Sanjay Sethi has fundamentally altered understanding of bacteria’s role in COPD and how the host responds to these infections. His lab was the first to demonstrate that bacterial infection is a major cause of exacerbations in COPD, the third-leading cause of death globally.

Subsequently, his findings that bacteria in the lower airways cause inflammation and are potentially harmful in stable COPD shifted another paradigm dramatically. Further, he demonstrated that changes in innate host responses, specifically in lung macrophages, make COPD patients more susceptible to infection.

For the past 25 years, Sethi has been highly successful in obtaining continuous funding for his research. In addition to intramural and industry-sponsored grants, he has served as principal investigator or co-PI on extramural awards totaling more than $8 million from the NIH, the Veterans Administration and the Department of Defense. Currently, he is co-PI on a $1.6 million DOD grant to develop the network biology of pathogen-host interactions during exacerbation in COPD, and co-I on a $2.8 million NIH grant to continue research into genome evolution during bacterial persistence in COPD.

Sethi has published 197 peer reviewed papers — many in high-impact journals — and has edited two books/series and written 14 book chapters.

A fellow of the American College of Physicians, he was named one of the top five COPD specialists in the U.S. in 2013 by the independent ranking platform Expertscape.

Regarded as an experienced educator and international expert on climate change, environmental studies and sustainability research, data and scholarship, Frederick Stoss serves as University Libraries’ liaison to Athletics and the departments of Biological Sciences, Environment and Sustainability, and Geology.

A UB employee since 1996, Stoss regularly finds innovative ways to collaborate with faculty members. His research methods are on the cutting edge of technology and standards within library science, and his expertise in environmental studies as they apply to librarianship are considered unparalleled. Quick to respond to departmental needs with insightful solutions, he has assisted in developing numerous library research classes — from 100-level classes to 400-level honors and graduate seminars — as well as new degree programs.

A prolific scholar, Stoss has co-authored three monographs, co-edited one and contributed chapters to five; contributed entries to over 15 reference works; and published 10 peer-reviewed articles. He has given over 45 invited presentations, seven of them international. Since 2010, he has been managing editor of the Electronic Green Journal, and also serves on the editorial advisory board of Environmental Impact and the academic advisory board of the Dictionary of Global Sustainability.

He served as chair of the American Library Association’s Task Force on the Environment, and chair of the Special Libraries Association’s Environmental Information Division, and facilitated its merger with the SLA’s Natural Resources Division to create the Environment and Resource Management Division. He recently served as chair of the Atmospheric Science Librarians International.

Stoss trained with Al Gore and his nonprofit organization, the Climate Reality Projects, and collaborated with colleagues to find solutions to the effects of climate change in the Caribbean.

Described as the “gatekeeper” for the dean’s office in the College of Arts and Sciences, Cath Swiech is known for her flexibility and creativity, as well as providing exemplary customer service. Her co-workers note she “consistently goes above and beyond what is expected of her current role in supporting the College of Arts and Sciences,” providing the highest level of service to students, faculty, staff and external community members as a first point of contact in the dean’s office.

Colleagues praise Swiech for being patient, kind and compassionate to students, who regularly arrive at her desk with a wide range of concerns, questions and paperwork, and for competently handling faculty requests with the same professional and compassionate approach.

She is known for regularly checking email off hours, staying late when needed and taking on additional duties. Her supervisors describe her as “always available” and a dedicated employee, who “balances a large workload with shifting priorities with a grace and ease” and who “clearly enjoys helping others succeed.”

Andrew Talal is regarded as a leader in the field of hepatology who has achieved national and international prominence as an authority on viral hepatitis.

Professor of medicine, and founder and inaugural director of the UBMD Center for Clinical Care and Research in Liver Disease, Talal conducts research on hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection and co-infection with HIV. He has developed biomarkers to determine hepatichistological progression and treatment outcomes in HCV infection, and has evaluated HCV-specific immune responses and treatment outcomes in special populations with HCV and HIV/HCV co-infection.

For the past decade, he has pursued novel approaches to engage substance use patients into care for viral hepatitis, among them using telemedicine to treat HCV patients in opioid treatment programs.

Talal’s research has been supported by the NIH continuously over his career, as well as by funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the pharmaceutical industry and foundations.

He currently is principal investigator for an NIH-supported HIV/AIDS clinical trial unit and a $7.5 million award from the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) for his pioneering work with patient-centered HCV care via telemedicine in people in recovery from substance use. This investigation is setting a new standard for care of this population, and has been recognized by the National Academy of Science, Engineering and Medicine, as well as the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

Talal is also a member of the Governor’s Task Force on the Elimination of Hepatitis C in New York State, and chair of the New York State Hepatitis C Telemedicine Workgroup.

Associate dean for clinical and translational science in the pharmacy school, Brian Tsuji is regarded by peers as “an international leader in the field of antimicrobial research” whose seminal work “holds great potential to shift paradigms and change the way we dose antibiotics in clinical practice around the globe.”

Tsuji’s research group was among the first to clarify and publish on a paradoxical effect in resistance development affecting polymyxin B, which has significant clinical implications for the drug’s use. The culmination of this work and leadership on antimicrobial pharmacology led to the First International Consensus Guidelines for the Optimal Use of the Polymyxin Antibiotics, which were endorsed by six infectious diseases and critical care societies and organizations around the globe.

Tsuji and members of his lab have published 94 manuscripts in prestigious journals, such as Lancet Infectious Diseases and mBIO. A dedicated mentor, he has had his PharmD students, PhD candidates, postdoctoral fellows and residents serve as first author on the majority of these papers. He also has had more than 200 peer-reviewed abstracts presented at both national and international meetings, some of which have received the highest honors bestowed by conference organizers.

He currently serves as president of the International Society for Anti-Infective Pharmacology.

Since 2014, Tsuji has been principal investigator for some of the largest Research Project Grants (RO1s) at UB: a $4.4 million NIH award to study novel strategies for polymyxin combinations against gram-negative superbugs, and a $4 million NIH award to answer important questions about emerging antibiotic resistance mechanisms globally.