Two Berkeley Lab Scientists Win DOE Distinguished Scientist Fellowships

BERKELEY, CA – Two scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) won Office of Biological and Environmental Research (BER) "Distinguished Scientist Fellowship" awards.

Mina Bissell
Terry Hazen

This is the first year of the awards, which recognize a scientist in each of BER's four divisions. Mina Bissell won in the Life Sciences Division for her work with breast cancer and the extracellular matrix. Terry Hazen won in the Environmental Remediation Sciences Division for his studies on the bioremediation of solvents and metals. Bissell and Hazen will each receive $250,000 per year for up to five years, while employed at Berkeley Lab.

Bissell, a Berkeley Lab Distinguished Scientist in the Life Sciences Division, has made pioneering scientific contributions in molecular cell biology in general, and in the fields of extracellular matrix and breast cancer research in particular. She has been effective as a leader, teacher, mentor and national spokesperson for scientific issues of fundamental importance. She is the recipient of numerous national and international awards including Milton Fellow, Fogarty Fellow, Guggenheim Award, AAAS Fellow, Institute of Medicine Fellow, DOE Ernest Orlando Lawrence award, Mellon award, and Eli/Lilly/Clowes award.

Hazen is a microbiologist who heads the Ecology Department of Berkeley Lab’s Earth Sciences Division. His research and technological achievements range from environmental ecology to infectious disease ecology. Hazen has worked within the DOE system for 20 years including at Savannah River National Laboratory and Savannah River Ecology Laboratory. He has conducted pioneering research on the bioremediation of solvents and metals, which is expected to play a critical role in the cleanup of DOE legacy wastes.

In addition to Bissell and Hazen, Ben Santer of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory was awarded a Climate Change Research Distinguished Fellowship. The Medical Sciences Distinguished Fellow is Joanna Fowler, a senior scientist at Brookhaven National Laboratory. These four BER Distinguished Fellows will receive their first funding in FY 2006.

The Distinguished Fellows will help advance and sustain scientific excellence in biological and environmental research at the national laboratories. Selections were made following external peer review of applications based on evidence of sustained scientific excellence, significant scientific achievements, honors and awards, quality of peer-reviewed publications in high impact journals, number of publications, research relevance to programmatic goals in BER, and recommendations from individuals at non-affiliated institutions.

Berkeley Lab is a U.S. Department of Energy national laboratory located in Berkeley, California. It conducts unclassified scientific research and is managed by the University of California. Visit our Website at www.lbl.gov.

Additional Information

• Visit the Bissell lab in Berkeley Lab's Life Sciences Division
• For more information about Berkeley Lab’s Ecology Department, headed by Hazen, visit http://www-esd.lbl.gov/ECO/index.html