Dr. Chuck Amsler faculty members Dr. Charles Amsler, professor, and Dr. Steven Austad, distinguished professor and department chair, were elected fellows of the American Association of the Advancement of Science. They are joined by Dr. David Briles, professor in the School of Medicine’s Department of Microbiology and Department of Pediatrics.Since 1986, UAB has had 13 faculty members selected to this prestigious organization. This is the second time since the program’s inception that three UAB faculty members were chosen as AAAS fellows in a single year. This year, 391 members were awarded fellows by the AAAS because of their scientifically or socially distinguished efforts to advance science or its applications.
Amsler’s research focuses on marine chemical ecology and behavior. He has traveled numerous times to Antarctica with other researchers and has made more than 750 research scuba dives there to study marine communities.
Dr. Steven Austad“I was thrilled to learn of my election as an AAAS fellow, and I am humbled to now be associated through this with many of the leading scientists in our nation,” Amsler said. “This was possible only because I have had the great fortune to have been associated throughout my 22-plus years here at UAB with so many outstanding research colleagues, in particular my students and postdocs.”
Austad is a leader in aging studies, and serves as the scientific director for the American Federation for Aging Research and directs UAB’s Nathan Shock Center of Excellence in the basic biology of aging. His specific research interests are in the use of nontraditional animal species as models for extending and enhancing human health and understanding gender differences in the way we age. (To read more about his research, see page 43.)
“It is a tremendous honor to be elected a fellow by the AAAS,” Austad said. “It’s an organization that stands for the very best in science and that emphasizes the importance of communicating science to the general public.”
