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NAMES AND FACES

CONGRATS

After nearly four decades of teaching in the UCLA English Department, Professor Frederick Burwick retired at the end of the last academic year. On behalf of Burwick’s colleagues and friends, Associate Professor of English Robert M. Maniquis arranged “A Colloquium in Honor of Frederick Burwick” at the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library.... This year’s non-Academic Senate Distinguished Teaching Award winners are: Andrew Hsu, philosophy lecturer; Kimberly Jansma, French lecturer; and Jennifer Westbay, Writing Programs lecturer. The Distinguished Teaching Assistant Award winners are: Anthony Friscia, organismic biology, ecology and evolution/Freshman Cluster Program; David Sanson, philosophy; Indre Vida Viskontas, psychology; Kelly Suk Yong Yi-Kang, Spanish and Portuguese; and Jerome-Ieronymos Zoidakis, chemistry and biochemistry.... Sociology Professor Walter R. Allen, a renowned educator and researcher on comparative race and ethnic relations, higher education and desegregation, was named the new Allan Murray Cartter Chair in Higher Education at the Graduate School of Education & Information Studies.

THREE CHEERS

Daniel Silverman, assistant professor of molecular and medical pharmacology, received an award for the top clinical abstract presented during the Academy of Molecular Imaging’s annual conference. His abstract compared the effectiveness of various tracers injected into patients to help identify and highlight brain tumors during positron emission tomography scans.... The selection committee of the School of Dentistry chose David Wong, chair of the Division of Oral Biology and Medicine and director of the Dental Research Institute, as distinguished faculty of the year. A special staff committee unanimously selected Veronica Rios, administrative analyst in the school’s Office of Financial Services, as outstanding staff member. ... The UC Police running team placed 13th in its division of 32 teams in the 2004 Baker to Vegas Challenge Cup Relay.

IN MEMORIAM

Joanne L. Freilich, director of the Public Policy Program at UCLA Extension, died of cancer on July 29. She was 54.

Freilich was born in Zanesville, Ohio, on March 31, 1950, and grew up in Hillsborough, Calif. She received her master’s degree in environmental planning from UCLA. For 15 years, Freilich worked as an environmental planner for the Southern California Association of Governments, a regional planning agency.

She continued her career at UCLA Extension, where she became program coordinator for the Public Policy Program in 1989 and its director in 1994. As director, Freilich developed and implemented conferences, research symposia, seminars and courses for policy leaders and professionals in areas such as land use, governance, transportation policy, economic development, environmental quality, housing policy, mediation and public infrastructure finance. Over the years, she organized and convened more than 350 UCLA Extension programs. Freilich also specialized in the training and education of international groups in public policy and worked with delegations from China, Taiwan, Thailand and the State Department-supported Hubert H. Humphrey International Fellows Program.

Freilich co-chaired the annual UCLA Extension Arrowhead Public Policy and Research Symposium series, examining the connections between transportation, land use and environmental quality. She was exceptionally gifted in integrating the expertise of faculty and public- and private-sector practitioners, generating meaningful dialogue that contributed to new regulatory frameworks and fostered sound development and improvements in the environment. Under her leadership, the Public Policy Program was awarded the Statewide Education Project Award in 1996 by the California chapter of the American Planning Association.

Freilich was an officer of the California Planning Round Table and a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners, the Southern California Gas Company Community Advisory Council, the American Planning Association and the Association of Environmental Professionals.

She is survived by her husband and partner of 31 years, Alan A. Mangels, California Deputy Attorney General; her sons, Michael Zachary, 19, a student at UCSD, and Daniel Ross, 16, a student at the Hamilton Humanities High School. She is also survived by her sister, Sallie Freilich Bernstein of San Mateo, Calif., and her brother and sister-in-law, Phillip and Sharon Freilich of Martinez, Calif.

In lieu of flowers, the family would appreciate donations made to the following organizations: the Simon Wiesenthal Museum of Tolerance, the Natural Resources Defense Fund, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Cancer Society.

Edward J. Hoffman, 62, co-inventor of the positron emission tomography (PET) scanner, died July 1.

Hoffman, a professor in the departments of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology and Radiological Sciences in the David Geffen School of Medicine, was also known for his strong leadership as program director of the Biomedical Physics Interdepartmental Graduate Program. Additionally, he was president of the IEEE Nuclear and Plasma Sciences Society, chief editor of the IEEE-NMIS Journal, and a member of the UCLA Graduate Council.

“Ed was a wonderful scientist with a great mind and a good heart,” said Michael Phelps, chairman of the Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology. “He was devoted to the many students that learned to do science in his lab and have themselves gone out in the world to create their own successes, never forgetting the precious present given them by Ed.”

Hoffman was born in 1942 in St. Louis, Mo., and attended Bishop DuBourg High School. He earned his bachelor of science degree in chemistry from St. Louis University in 1963 and his Ph.D. in nuclear chemistry from Washington University in St. Louis in 1970. He completed his postgraduate work in nuclear chemistry at the Benjamin Franklin Institute at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1972 he joined the faculty of Washington University’s School of Medicine, where he and Phelps began developing what later became known as the PET scanner. Subsequently, Phelps and Hoffman moved to the University of Pennsylvania.

In 1976, the two came to the UCLA School of Medicine with a close-knit group of researchers. They joined the Department of Radiological Sciences and the Laboratory of Nuclear Medicine and Radiation Biology.

In his years at UCLA, Hoffman achieved international recognition in the science field of medical imaging. He received many awards over the years, most recently the 2002 IEEE Medical Imaging Scientist Award. He was a member of the Society of Nuclear Medicine, a charter member of the IEEE/Medical Imaging Society, and a member of the Scientific and Medical Advisory Board of Gamma-Medica Inc.

Hoffman leaves behind Carolyn, his wife of 33 years; his mother, Marcella Hoffman; sisters Judy Archer, Linda Briesacher and Patti Hoffman; brother Jim Hoffman; and aunt Mary LaFata, all of St. Louis. He also leaves sister Kay Trost of Plano, Texas; brother John Hoffman of Windsor, Mo.; and many extended family members. Hoffman’s father, Fred Hoffman, died in 1980.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to the Edward J. Hoffman Graduate Fellowship Fund, UCLA Biomedical Physics Interdepartmental Graduate Program, 1V 365 CHS, 10833 Le Conte Ave., Box 951721, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1721. Make checks payable to the UCLA Foundation. For more information, contact Terry Moore at (310) 825 7811.

Baldwin Gaylord Lamson, professor emeritus of pathology and laboratory medicine and the first director of hospitals and clinics at UCLA, died July 2 of heart failure in Davis, Calif. He was 88.

Lamson oversaw a period of rapid growth at UCLA Medical Center, which nearly doubled in size under his leadership from 1966 to 1980. He also is credited with bringing UCLA’s medical laboratories and management into the computer age. He received the UCLA Medical Alumni Association’s Award of Extraordinary Merit in 1994 in recognition of his many contributions.

Born in Berkeley, Calif., in 1916, Lamson graduated from the University of California with a B.A. in seismology and physics in 1938. He worked as a successful petroleum engineer before earning his M.D. at the University of Rochester (New York) in 1944.

Sherman M. Mellinkoff, dean emeritus of the medical school, recalled that Lamson’s experience with a group of medical students while on assignment in Saudi Arabia so impressed the young engineer that he decided to pursue a medical career instead. “Dr. Lamson was always willing to do things to help other people. He was very altruistic, honorable and capable,” Mellinkoff said.

During World War II and immediately following he served in the U.S. Navy as a pathologist, joining UCLA in 1951 as an assistant professor of pathology. At UCLA, he also served as associate dean for hospital affairs from 1965 to 1977 and as assistant chancellor of health sciences from 1977 to 1980. In addition, he served as vice president, financial and business management, for the University of California from 1980 until 1982.

Lamson is survived by his wife, Ormie Lamson, four children and numerous grandchildren.

Arthur J. Moss, professor emeritus at the David Geffen School of Medicine who devoted five decades to the health of the young, died July 14. He was 90.

Moss was an internationally recognized authority in the field of pediatric hypertension and made many impressive contributions to the field of pediatric cardiology, among them his findings on cardiovascular changes in newborns. He also studied pulmonary artery pressure in newborns and the cardiopulmonary status of cystic fibrosis patients. His book, “Heart Disease in Infants, Children and Adolescents,” has become the standard text in pediatric cardiology.

“He was a true pioneer and one of the founders of our field,” said Thomas Klitzner, chief of pediatric cardiology at the David Geffen School of Medicine and the Mattel Children’s Hospital at UCLA.

Born in St. Paul, Minn., in 1914, Moss attended the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, where he earned his medical degree in 1938. He performed his internship at Minneapolis General Hospital from 1937 through 1939 and completed a pediatric fellowship at the University of Minnesota in 1942. He served in the U.S. Army Medical Corps from 1942 through 1946, where he rose to the rank of major.

He came to California in 1946 and started a private practice in pediatric medicine in Inglewood, which he continued through 1960. He was chairman of the Pediatrics Department at Los Angeles Harbor General Hospital, now known as Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, in Torrance, Calif., from 1948 through 1951. He also served as head of the Department of Pediatrics at Methodist Hospital in Los Angeles in 1951.

“Dr. Moss will be remembered as the consummate teacher who remained active in educating our pediatric residents until very recently,” said Edward McCabe, physician-in-chief of the Mattel Children’s Hospital at UCLA. “He was an outstanding leader who recruited young faculty to UCLA and nurtured their careers so they could become nationally recognized experts in the care of children.”

Moss joined UCLA Medical School in 1952 as an assistant clinical professor of pediatrics. His other positions at the medical school included executive chairman of the Department of Pediatrics from 1967 through 1977 and chief of the Pediatric Cardiology Division from 1977 until his retirement in 1981.

He won many awards, including the Los Angeles County Heart Association Award of Merit for three consecutive years (1964–66), the Susan and Theodore Cummings Humanitarian Award (1967), the Leadership Award from the National Cystic Fibrosis Research Foundation and the Outstanding Service Award from the American Academy of Pediatrics (both in 1973), the Outstanding Service Award from the American Journal of Cardiology (1978), the UCLA Pediatric Housestaff Teaching Award (1971–72 and 1977–78) and the Ventura County Medical Center Teaching Award (1992).

He also is cited in Who’s Who in America and is the namesake of the annual Arthur J. Moss Lectureship in the Mattel Children’s Hospital at UCLA.

Moss was a major contributor to the activities of many professional organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Heart Association, the American Pediatric Society, the California Heart Association, the California Medical Association, the California Society of Pediatric Cardiology, the Los Angeles County Heart Association, the National Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, the Society for Experimental Biology and Medicine, the Western Association of Physicians, and UCLA’s Jules Stein Eye Institute, which pioneered the field of pediatric ophthalmology.

Moss was the loving husband of the late Alice Moss and is survived by his children, Stephanie, Tom and Patsy, and his grandchildren, Jessica, Hart, Alice, Lindsey and Rachel.

The family requests that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to support the Arthur Moss Endowment Fund through a gift to the UCLA Foundation, c/o Medical Sciences Development, 10945 Le Conte Ave., Suite 3132, Los Angeles, CA 90095.

Professor Emeritus of Surgery Kenneth Ramming, who helped launch the liver transplant program at UCLA Medical Center, died June 29. He was 65.

A native of Fort Wayne, Ind., Ramming was educated at Valparaiso University in Indiana and at Duke University Medical School. He came to UCLA Medical Center as a surgeon and teacher in 1974. During his tenure here, Ramming helped establish UCLA’s liver transplant program. He also made strides in cancer treatment while working at St. John’s Hospital and at the John Wayne Cancer Institute.

In the early 1990s, Ramming became internationally known for his research in the new field of cryosurgery. The technique involves using liquid nitrogen to reduce tumors to minus-190 degrees Celsius, freezing them. The tumors can be killed with two 15-minute freezing and thawing cycles. Once the dead tumor thaws, it transforms into a gray mush that can be reabsorbed by the body.

The foremost proponent of cryosurgery in the Los Angeles area, along with Wilson S. Wong of Alhambra Hospital, Ramming began using the technique on tumors in the liver and prostate that could not be removed with conventional surgery.

After performing 120 cryosurgeries on livers and 55 on prostate tumors with promising results, he began adapting the technique for treatment of pancreatic cancer. Ramming experimented with dogs and human cadavers for two years, then performed his first pancreatic cryosurgery in October 1994. Within a few months, Ramming had performed half a dozen of the pancreatic operations and considered the technique promising.

Ramming is survived by his wife, Mary Ann; three sons, Peter, Paul and James; and one granddaughter.