FASEB Names Louis Justement President

Tuesday, June 30, 2020

Louis B. Justement, PhD, begins his term as FASEB President on July 1. Justement is Professor of Microbiology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). He is also Director of the Graduate Biomedical Sciences Immunology Graduate Theme and the Undergraduate Immunology Program at UAB.

An immunologist, Justement’s research interests focus on the signal transduction processes underlying B lymphocyte activation and differentiation. His laboratory examines signaling pathways that control the germinal center response and terminal B cell differentiation leading to the production of class-switched, high-affinity, long-lived plasma cells.

Justement has been actively involved in FASEB for more than 10 years. He served as Chair of the FASEB Science Policy Committee’s Training and Career Opportunities Subcommittee from 2008 to 2018 and as FASEB Vice President for Science Policy from 2018 to 2019. He is also a member of four FASEB member societies: the American Association of Immunologists (AAI), the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB), the Society for Experimental Biology and Medicine (SEBM), and the Society for Leukocyte Biology (SLB). Learn more about Justement in a recent interview with FASEB staff.

Patricia L. Morris, Kevin C. Kregel, and Mary-Ann Bjornsti will also move into new elected officer positions.

Patricia L. Morris, MS, PhD, a molecular endocrinologist and pharmacologist, was named FASEB President-elect. She holds appointments as Guest Investigator at The Rockefeller University, Scientist at the Research Foundation to Cure AIDS, and Associate Editor for The FASEB Journal. She is also former Executive Director of Biomedical Research and Development, Reproductive Health and Senior Scientist in the Center for Biomedical Research at the Population Council. Morris has been active on the FASEB Board since 2010 and served as Vice President for Science Policy (2019-2020). Like Justement, she is a member of four FASEB member societies: American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (ASPET), the Endocrine Society, Society for Developmental Biology (SDB), and the Society for the Study of Reproduction (SSR).

Kevin C. Kregel, PhD, was named FASEB Vice President for Science Policy. Kregel is Executive Vice Provost and Senior Associate Provost for Faculty at the University of Iowa. Actively involved in the FASEB Science Policy Committee, he was Chair of the Committee’s Animals in Research and Education Subcommittee from 2008 to 2018. He is also a member of the American Physiological Society (APS) and served as APS’s representative to the FASEB Board from 2018 to 2020. 

Mary-Ann Bjornsti, PhD, was named Vice President-elect for Science Policy. She is Chair of the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at UAB and Associate Director for Translational Research at the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center. Bjornsti is also Secretary/Treasurer-elect of ASPET and a member of ASBMB and the Genetics Society of America (GSA).

Joining the new officers on the FASEB Board is the inaugural early-career representative: Dennis Jones, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the Boston University School of Medicine. He is a member of the American Society for Investigative Pathology (ASIP).