Five faculty members appointed to endowed professorships

Four Stanford Medicine faculty members were recently appointed to endowed professorships.

James Chang, MD, professor and chief of plastic and reconstructive surgery, has been appointed the Johnson & Johnson Professor, effective June 11. His research focuses on tissue engineering, and his clinical specialty is reconstructive surgery of the hand.

This professorship was established at the School of Medicine in 1978 as one of six chairs provided to medical schools by Johnson & Johnson Corp. to support the activities of surgery departments in patient care, research and teaching. Ralph Greco, MD, professor and chief of surgery, currently holds the professorship but will be moving to emeritus status at the end of August.

Jeffrey Feinstein, MD, MPH, professor of pediatrics, was appointed the Dunlevie Family Professor of Pulmonary Vascular Disease, effective June 11. He specializes in pediatric cardiology, pulmonary hypertension, pulmonary vascular disease, pulmonary vascular abnormalities and congenital heart defects.

The professorship was established with an existing endowment fund, the Endowed Directorship of the Vera Moulton Wall Center. This professorship was converted from a directorship established in 2010 by Bruce and Elizabeth Dunlevie. 

Mary Hawn, MD, professor and chair of surgery, was appointed the Stanford Medicine Professor of Surgery, effective June 11. She specializes in surgical quality and effectiveness.

This professorship was established with internal funds, as well as funds from Stanford Health Care and from Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford, to honor former department chair Thomas Krummel, MD, the Emile Holman Professor in Surgery, the Susan B. Ford Surgeon-in-Chief at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford and co-director of Stanford Biodesign.

Calvin Kuo, MD, PhD, professor of medicine, was appointed the Maureen Lyles D’Ambrogio Professor II, effective June 11. His research focuses on developing methods to grow tissues and tumor samples to create therapies for cancer patients and discover cancer-related genes. He also studies stem cell biology in the gastrointestinal tract, and examines the role of blood vessels in diseases such as stroke, cancer and diabetes.

This professorship was established through the transfer of funds from the existing Maureen Lyles D’Ambrogio Professorship and additional funds from the Department of Medicine and the dean’s office. The Maureen Lyles D’Ambrogio Professorship was established in 1970, with a gift of real estate from N.J. D’Ambrogio, ’17, of Carmel, California, to honor his daughter, who died of cancer in 1967. The professorship was established to support research on cancer. 

Ivan Soltesz, PhD, was appointed the James R. Doty Professor in Neurosurgery and Neurosciences, effective June 11. His research focuses on the function and dysfunction of neuronal networks, and the mechanisms of circuit dysfunction in epilepsy. He has developed experimental methods for the control of epilepsy.

The professorship was established with a gift from Doty, MD, professor of neurosurgery at Stanford and director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education.