Distinguished Alumni Award


John C. Cambier 72MS, 75PhD

2010 Achievement Award

John C. Cambier, 72MS, 75PhD, is a star in the field of immunology—renowned as one of the world's leading scientists for decoding the mystery of how the human body launches its defense against disease.

Widely respected as a researcher, educator, administrator, and mentor, Cambier is currently chair of the Integrated Department of Immunology at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center and the National Jewish Medical and Research Center. He is also the Ida and Cecil Green Endowed Distinguished Professor of Cell Biology.

Previously, he served for five years served as director of immunology of Cadus Pharmaceutical Corporation and as a faculty member or visiting fellow at institutions including Duke University Medical Center, the Basel Institute for Immunology in Basel, Switzerland, the Curie Institute in Paris, France, and the Burnet Institute in Melbourne, Australia.

While he can claim many seminal contributions to the field of immunology, Cambier is most widely recognized as an international leader of research into a vital subset of immune cells called "B lymphocytes" that produce the antibodies so critical to protecting us from illness. Virtually all current vaccines act by stimulating B cells to produce antibodies.

Cambier specifically studies the signaling mechanics that induce these cells to produce germ-fighting antibodies. More than any other laboratory in the world, his has increased the biochemical understanding of the complexity of triggers and controllers that drive our humoral immune response.

In recognition of his professional stature, Cambier is a frequent guest at prestigious scientific meetings and recipient of numerous awards. In 2009, members of the American Association of Immunologists honored him with their highest level of peer recognition by inviting him to give a Distinguished Investigator Lecture during their annual meeting in Seattle. Last fall, he became one of only 56 current and former faculty members of the University of Colorado system to be awarded the title "Distinguished Professor of the University of Colorado."

Cambier also received an Outstanding Scientific Achievement Award from the National Jewish Medical and Research Center in 2002, and, in 1999, a UI Carver College of Medicine Distinguished Alumni Award for Achievement.

In addition to receiving continuous research funding—including numerous grants from the National Institutes of Health, the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation, and the American Cancer Society—Cambier has co-authored more than 230 peer-reviewed articles appearing in many high-profile scientific journals, as well as more than 40 reviews and book chapters. These efforts no doubt contributed to his recognition in 2005 as the Institute for Scientific Information's Most Highly Cited award.

A holder of five patents, Cambier has developed cutting-edge technologies to test his theories and hypotheses—advancements that have propelled his field forward into new, uncharted directions. Further extending the depth and breadth of his research, Cambier has directly supervised 12 doctoral candidates and mentored some 50 postdoctoral fellows, many of whom have advanced toward faculty positions of their own in major academic centers and leadership positions in industry and private practice.

With this Distinguished Alumni Award, the University of Iowa is proud to recognize John C. Cambier's outstanding contributions to life-enhancing science.

Cambier is an annual member of the UI Alumni Association.


About Distinguished Alumni Awards

Since 1963, the University of Iowa has annually recognized accomplished alumni and friends with Distinguished Alumni Awards. Awards are presented in seven categories: Achievement, Service, Hickerson Recognition, Faculty, Staff, Recent Graduate, and Friend of the University.


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The Krause Essay Prize and its $10,000 award is presented annually by a unique panel of judges: UI graduate students. Photo: Tim Schoon/UI Office of Strategic Communication Students in the University of Iowa Nonfiction Writing Program's graduate seminar dug into their weekly reading assignments with particular enthusiasm this past spring?and for good reason. By the end of the semester, they were tasked with selecting the best of the bunch for a prestigious award on behalf of a university known for its literary tradition. This marks the 12th year that nonfiction graduate students served as judges for the newly renamed Krause Essay Prize, a national award presented to an essayist who pushes the boundaries of the genre through experimentation, exploration, and discovery. Thought to be the only national literary honor selected by students, the prize is accompanied by a $10,000 award for the first time this year thanks to a new partnership between the UI Nonfiction Writing Program and the Kyle J. and Sharon Krause Family Foundation. Shawn Wen, winner of the 2018 Krause Essay Prize, is the author of A Twenty Minute Silence Followed by Applause. Her writing has appeared in The New Inquiry, Seneca Review, Iowa Review, White Review, and the anthology City by City: Dispatches from the American Metropolis. This year's Krause Essay Prize recipient is Shawn Wen, a San Francisco-based multimedia artist and the author of A Twenty Minute Silence Followed by Applause (Sarabande Books, 2017), a book-length essay on the life of French mime Marcel Marceau. Wen, whom students selected from a pool of 14 nominees, accepted her award at a ceremony in September in the Old Capitol Senate Chamber. Nicol?s Medina Mora Perez, a third-year MFA student from Mexico City, was among the prize judges in the spring seminar taught by author and Nonfiction Writing Program director John D'Agata (98MFA). Perez said that beyond discussing the merits of the nominated essays each week, class conversations revolved around how they define essay writing and the type of nonfiction they wanted to champion as representatives of the UI. By serving as judges, Perez says, students had the opportunity to read a broad selection of contemporary nonfiction that they may not have otherwise sought out. "By the end of the semester I had a clearer idea of the sort of work that people are publishing today, which includes stuff that I'd like to imitate and stuff that I'd rather not," Perez says. "I guess it's a bit like watching the World Cup with your soccer teammates: You see moves that you think are cool and want to steal for your own gameplay, but you also notice pitfalls that you should learn to avoid." Wen says she's been "over the moon" since learning she was selected as this year's Krause Essay Prize winner. A producer for Youth Radio in Oakland, California, Wen says discovering essay writing "was very much like falling in love" and has long admired the UI's approach to the genre. "When I started writing essays, I felt like all these dusty windows in my brain were opened, letting in light and fresh air," she says. "It's incredibly meaningful to me that my writing has been recognized by this program and its students." D'Agata dreamed up the prize in 2007 as a way to introduce his students to high-caliber essay writing and the many forms it can take. The professor asked colleagues from around the country to recommend their favorite essays from the past year, which he then compiled into a reading list for his seminar. As an added twist, D'Agata noted that submissions could be from any medium?including radio and film?as long as they were "essayistic." To give class discussions a sense of consequence, D'Agata had students evaluate each piece at the end of the semester and select a single award winner. Author Aaron Kunin received the inaugural Essay Prize, as the award was previously known, and it soon became an annual tradition. D'Agata's seminar students spend the semester dissecting the pieces, giving presentations, and writing critiques for the The Essay Review, the Nonfiction Writing Program's national magazine. Over the years, the class has crowned winners as varied as poet?Claudia Rankine, science writer Oliver Sacks, performance artist Sophie Calle, and the producers of Radio Lab. A current group of 14 writers and artists from around the nation serve as the nominating committee, includes luminaries like Roxane Gay, Leslie Jamison (06MFA), and Kiese Laymon. "In the U.S. we do a great job teaching students about the powers and pleasures of reading and writing?poetry and fiction, but not so much with essays," says D'Agata, who in 2016 published an anthology titled The Making of the American Essay. "Essays are often an afterthought in literature classes in America." In 2017, the Kyle J. and Sharon Krause Family Foundation made a $500,000 donation to bolster the endowment of the UI Nonfiction Writing Program?the largest gift in the distinguished program's history. Founded in 1976, the Nonfiction Writing Program, a graduate program within the Department of English, is regularly ranked among the best in the nation and has launched the careers of alumni who have gone on to write for magazines like the New Yorker, Rolling Stone and Harper's. "The Krause Foundation is about giving back and giving forward," says Elliott Krause (14MFA), a Nonfiction Writing Program alumnus who now works at the Wall Street Journal. "Helping fund the Essay Prize is a rare chance to do both. Eleven Krauses and counting have graduated from the University of Iowa; the Krause Essay Prize is a way to both express our gratitude for all Iowa has given us and be a champion for the arts." The support from the Krause family has not only allowed the program to award a cash prize for the first time, but also to invite winners to campus to present their essays and spend time with students and faculty. When Wen visited in late September, she taught a series of master classes for nonfiction students. D'Agata says that the foundation's support further legitimizes the idea of a student-driven award and its importance to the literary world. "It's also helping to bring attention to the entire genre," D'Agata says. "There are a lot of awards out there for works of fiction and poetry, but very few awards for essays. This award is saying, 'essays are awesome.' If you're an essayist, you don't hear that very?often. The Krause Foundation is helping to fix that." Krause Essay Prize Winners The UI Nonfiction Writing Program has awarded a national essay-writing prize annually since 2007. With support from the Kyle J. and Sharon Krause Family Foundation, the award was renamed the Krause Essay Prize this year. For more on the prize, visit krauseessayprize.org. 2018: Shawn Wen, A Twenty Minute Silence Followed by Applause 2017: Peter Middleton and James Spinney, Notes on Blindness 2016: Oliver Sacks, Gratitude 2015: Claudia Rankine, Citizen 2014: Sophie Calle, The Address Book 2013: David Rakoff, Waiting 2012: Lauren Redniss, Radioactive 2011: Judith Schalansky, Atlas of Remote Islands 2010: Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich, New Normal? 2009: Mary Ruefle, The Most of It 2008: Joshua Raskin, I Met the Walrus 2007: Aaron Kunin, Secret Architecture

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