- Professor Jean-François Bach
(d. 2023)
Jean-François BACH is Professor of Immunology at Necker Hospital in Paris. He has had a long-standing interest in organ transplantation and autoimmune diseases, notably insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM) and systemic lupus erythematosus. His main contributions include the description of E rosettes, the discovery of thymulin, a thymic peptide involved in T-cell differentiation, the description and characterization of regulatory T-cells in the non-obese diabetic mouse and the first demonstration of the therapeutic effect of cyclosporin A in recently diagnosed diabetic patients.
Professor Bach is a founding member of the ASL and also a member of the French Academy of Sciences.
He passed away on December 22, 2023.
Sample of Academician’s Research
Thymulin is a nonapeptide produced by two distinct epithelial populations in the thymus. It was discovered by Prof. Bach in 1977.
Researchers hope to develop drugs thwarting inflammatory processes associated with neurodegenerative diseases and even rheumatism with the help of thymulin analogs.
Professor Makhluf J. Haddadin
(d. 2022)
Makhluf J. Haddadin was born in M’ain, Jordan. He won a full scholarship from the Jordanian Ministry of Education to study Chemistry at the American University of Beirut from which he graduated with a B.Sc. degree followed by an M.Sc. degree with Professor Costas H. Issidorides. Thereafter, he left for the University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, USA where he worked with Professor Alfred Hassner and received a Ph.D. degree in Organic Chemistry. After two years of postdoctoral work under the guidance of Professor Louis Fieser at Harvard University, he joined the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at the American University of Beirut where he is now a Professor of Chemistry.
Professor Haddadin considered himself a Heterocyclic Chemist whose contribution to this field of Chemistry was topped by his co-invention in 1965, with Emeritus Professor Costas H. Issidorides, of what is currently known in the chemical literature as “The Beirut Reaction”, and his co-discovery in 2004 with Mark J. Kurth, a Distinguished Professor at the University of California, Davis, of the “Davis-Beirut Reaction”. In addition to his study of the rich chemistry of the Beirut Reaction, Professor Haddadin did original work in the areas of Isobenzofuran, Isoindoles, tetrazines, quinolines, furans, pyrroles, cinnolines, and indazoles. He had over 115 publications in internationally refereed journals and some 42 patents in 25 countries.
Over the years, Professor Haddadin served his Alma Matter, the American University of Beirut, in various capacities, including as Vice President for Academic Affairs (12 years), Acting Dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences (3.5 years), Chair of the Chemistry Department (10 years), occasional Acting Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Acting Deputy President and Acting President. Much of this service was invaluable to the University as it coincided with the difficult years of the Lebanese civil strife of 1975-1989. In addition to his passion for Heterocyclic Chemistry, Professor Haddadin loved poetry, especially Arabic poetry.
Professor Haddadin was elected to the ASL in 2009 for "his seminal discoveries in organic chemistry and his contributions to the synthesis of compounds of medicinal importance." He passed away on September 21, 2022.
Sample of Academician's Research
The Beirut Reaction may be described as a very simple method, “click chemistry”, for making hundreds if not thousands of heterocyclic compounds, some of which have anti-bacterial activities or anti-cancer properties. The latter are exemplified by the trade names of Carbadox and Mecadox, which were marketed by the Pfizer drug company. One compound that has been made by the Beirut Reaction is TPZ (3-amino-1,2,4-benzotriazene 1,4-dioxide), which is currently in the third stage of clinical testing as an anticancer drug.
The Davis-Beirut Reaction provides a simple and cost-effective method for synthesizing a specific class of indazoles having desirable pharmaceutical properties, such as anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer activities.
Professor André Capron
(d. 2020)
Foreign Secretary, French Academy of Sciences
André Capron, né le 30 décembre 1930, était Docteur en Médecine. Il a été Chef du service d'immunologie au CHU de Lille (1970-2000), Professeur à l'université de Lille (1970-2000), Directeur du Centre d'immunologie et de Biologie Parasitaire à l'Institut Pasteur (1975-2001), et Directeur de l'Institut Pasteur de Lille (1994-2000). Il était Professeur émérite à l'université de Lille et Directeur honoraire de l'Institut Pasteur de Lille.
Professeur Capron a été Président du Conseil scientifique de l'Inserm (1987-1991), Président du Conseil d'administration de l'ANRS (1999-2002), Président du Comité stratégique régional de recherche en biologie et santé (depuis 1993), et membre du Conseil scientifique de l'École normale supérieure (depuis 2001).
Son engagement pour le développement de la recherche biomédicale dans les pays du tiers Monde l'a amené à créer, avec Pierre Aigrain, la première Commission Nationale "Santé et Développement", puis à présider le premier programme européen Sciences et Techniques en faveur du développement (1983-1987). Il a été président du programme Bilharziose de l'OMS (1997-1983), et à l'issue de ce mandat, il a été membre du Scientific Advisory Group of Experts de l'OMS (1987-1999) et membre du Scientific and Technical Advisory Committee de l'OMS (1988-1992).
Proesseur Capron a consacré l'ensemble de sa carrière scientifique à l'étude de la biologie des parasites et au développement de nouvelles stratégies de prévention des grandes endémies parasitaires, notamment les bilharzioses. Parallèlement à ses activités de recherche, il a pris une part active au développement de la recherche biomédicale dans les pays en développement.
Après des travaux d'helminthologie comparée, Professeur Capron s'est intéressé à une discipline alors naissante, l'immunochimie, et a orienté ses activités vers l'immunologie parasitaire dont il est désormais reconnu comme l'un des fondateurs. Ses travaux ont conduit au développement de méthodes nouvelles de diagnostic immunologique des maladies parasitaires (bilharzioses, hydatidose, distomatose) et parallèlement à la mise en évidence des relations moléculaires ente l'hôte et le parasite. La découverte de parentés antigéniques entre parasite et hôte a jeté les bases du concept de mimétisme hôte-parasite. André Capron a continué pendant toute sa carrière à analyser la relation hôte parasite et est l'auteur de nombreux travaux fondamentaux dans le déchiffrage de ce qu'il a nommé "le langage moléculaire" des parasites.
Ayant abordé le domaine fondamental des mécanismes immunitaires dans des modèles expérimentaux d'affections parasitaires et chez l'homme, Professeur Capron s'est consacré plus particulièrement à l'étude des schistosomes et de la schistosomiase. Il a ainsi mis en évidence l'existence d'anticorps cytotoxiques dans la schistosomiase humaine et démontré la production par les parasites de facteurs immunosuppresseurs. Appliquant très tôt les techniques de production d'anticorps monoclonaux et les techniques de biologie moléculaire, Professeur Capron et son équipe ont mené des travaux fondamentaux sur la génétique moléculaire des schistosomes, qui ont conduit à l'identification et au clonage moléculaire d'une protéine vaccinante dans la schistosomiase. Ce vaccin, entré en phase d'essais cliniques depuis 1998, est le résultat de progrès considérables dans la définition d'un vaccin potentiel contre la bilharziose, seconde endémie parasitaire mondiale après le paludisme.
Professeur Capron a identifié de nouveaux mécanismes effecteurs de l'immunité anti-parasitaire : il a démontré les fonctions protectrices des anticorps IgE dans l'immunité anti-parasitaire; il a découvert un mécanisme totalement nouveau de cytotoxicité antiparasitaire impliquant des macrophages ; il a élucidé le rôle des macrophages, des éosinophiles et des plaquettes et il a décrit une nouvelle classe de récepteurs pour les IgE sur les cellules inflammatoires, jetant les bases de nouveaux concepts concernant les mécanismes cellulaires impliqués non seulement dans la réponse immunitaire contre les parasites, mais également dans les affections allergiques.Parmi ses nombreux prix et distinctions figurent le Prix Leveau de l'Académie Nationale de Médecine (1959); le Prix Richard Lounsbery, Académie des Sciences et National Academy of Sciences, États-Unis (1986); Bernard Nocht Medal (1987); le Prix International de Médecine, King Faisal Foundation (1990); Commandeur de l'Ordre du Lion (1990); Commandeur de l'Ordre national du Mérite (1990); Membre de l'Académie nationale de médecine (1991); et Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur (1992).
Professor Capron was a founding member of the ASL. He passed away on January 10, 2020.
Sample of Academician's Research
Schistosomiasis, the second major parasitic disease in the world after malaria, affects 200 million people.
Research developed in Professor Capron's laboratory over the last 20 years, with a focus on the identification of novel effector mechanisms, for a first time to a feasible approach to vaccine development against Schistosomiasis, a major human parasitic disease.
Learn more...Dr. Jean Michel Dercourt
(d. 2019)
Jean Michel Dercourt était Professeur émérite à l'université Pierre et Marie Curie (depuis 2004) et Secrétaire perpétuel de l'Académie des Sciences (France) (depuis Janvier 1996).
Né le 11 mars 1935. Études supérieures à la Faculté des sciences de Paris 1957; Stagiaire de recherche au CNRS 1958; Agrégé de sciences naturelles 1959-1965; Chef de travaux à la Faculté des sciences de Paris 1962-1963; Service militaire, École d'Enfants de Troupe des Andelys 1964; Docteur ès sciences, Faculté des sciences de Paris 1965-1979; Professeur à l'université de Lille 1969; Chercheur invité à l'université d'Edmonton (Alberta, Canada) 1979-2004; Professeur à l'université Pierre et Marie Curie à Paris 1979-1990; Directeur du laboratoire de géologie comparée des continents et des océans associé au CNRS 1987-1988; Chercheur invité à l'Imperial College (Université de Londres) 1987-1992; Co-directeur avec L.E. Ricou (CNRS-Paris) de l'équipe du programme de groupement scientifique Tethys, associant BP, BRGM, CNRS-INSU, ELF, IFP, IFREMER, SHELL, TOTAL, UPMC 1993-2001; Co-directeur avec M. Gaetani (université de Milan) du programme Péri-Tethys, regroupant AGIP, ARCO, BRGM, CHEVRON, CONOCO, ELF, EXXON, IFP, SHELL, SONATRACH.Professeur Dercourt a consacré son œuvre scientifique à la géologie des formations sédimentaires des chaînes de montagne édifiées depuis 250 millions d’années.
Après avoir contribué à l’étude géologique d’un secteur du Péloponnèse septentrional et de la Méditerranée orientale (1958-1968), il a abordé la géodynamique de la Cordillère canadienne. À l’époque où l’hypothèse de la tectonique des plaques prenait naissance, il a participé à la reconstitution des principaux domaines de cette Cordillère et a mis en évidence des nappes de charriage à matériels ophiolitiques traduisant l’écrasement d’un océan paléozoïque (300 millions d’années) au cœur de la chaîne (1968-1972). La comparaison avec une partie de la chaîne alpine a montré l’extension de la tectonique globale à l’histoire ancienne de la Terre.
Professeur Dercourt a utilisé la stratigraphie multi-critères qui s'est révélée l'outil idéal pour effectuer des corrélations stratigraphiques à grande échelle. Il a pris part à une étude pluridisciplinaire (biostratigraphie, chimiostratigraphie magnétostratigraphie) de séries sédimentaires qui a permis de reconnaître les plus courtes unités de dépôt dans un site donné (1979-1980).
Professeur Dercourt, en deux programmes internationaux (Téthys et Peri-Thétys, 1987-2004) associant des chercheurs et des ingénieurs d'universités, d'établissements publics de recherche, de services géologiques nationaux et de compagnies pétrolières, s’est attaché à la paléodynamique et au paléoenvironnement de la Téthys, océan ouvert dans la Pangée au Permien, il y a 250 millions d’années, qui sépara les continents septentrionaux des méridionaux, puis qui se ferme depuis 80 millions d’années pour ne laisser subsister aujourd’hui que l’Atlantique central. Il a réalisé des cartographies de plusieurs époques depuis l’ouverture jusqu’à la fermeture actuelle ce qui a permis de reconnaître les environnements marins et terrestres de ce secteur significatif à l’échelle du globe.
Ces travaux montrent, entre autre, que la corrélation entre la chronologie des événements tectoniques et l'histoire de l'expansion des océans actuels est parfaitement réalisable, que le cadre tectonique du Paléozoïque contrôle les contraintes à la fois pendant l'expansion et pendant la collision, que la localisation latitudinale N et S des cratons est le principal facteur de sédimentation et que la Téthys, à la différence de l'océan Atlantique actuel, est segmenté par trois seuils lithosphériques (seuils indonésien, méditerranéen et caraïbe) constitués de fragments de la lithosphère continentale entre les marges, ces seuils contrôlent le modèle structural pendant les phases de collision cratonique. Ces reconstitutions ont également des applications importantes dans la localisation de substances d’intérêt industriel (essentiellement des hydrocarbures et également phosphates, bauxites, or...).Parmi ses nombreux prix et distinctions:
- Prix Visquenel de la Société Géologique de France (1966)
- Prix Gonelet (Prix de la Société Industrielle du Nord) (1966)
- Médaille Fourmarier (Société Géologique de Belgique) (1968)
- Médaille d’argent du CNRS (1969)
- Prix Von Buch, Société Géologique d’Allemagne (1996)
- Award international de l'American Association Petroleum Geology (1999)
- Docteur Honoris Causa de l'Université des Sciences de la Terre de Beijing (1992), de l'Universitéde Sofia (1995), de l’Université d’Athènes (1997), de l'Institut catholique de Paris (2000)
- Commandeur de l’Ordre national du Mérite
- Officier de la Légion d'Honneur
Professor Dercourt was a founding member of the ASL. He passed away on March 22, 2019.
Sample of Academician's Research
The product of the coordinated efforts of 120 academic geologists from a number of countries and institutes, the Atlas Tethys of Paleonvironmental maps was edited by Professor Dercourt and two of his colleagues. It is a major reference work that presents a revised kinematic reconstruction of the Tethyan plates and microplates from the mid-Permian times to the late Miocene, spanning some 260 millions years, with a paleolatitudes grid drawn on each map.Get in Touch with Nadia!
Dr. Hussein M. Zbib
(d. 2020)
Hussein M. Zbib was born November, 26, 1958 in Beirut, Lebanon. He was the Director of the School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering at Washington State University. He received his doctor of philosophy in Mechanical Engineering and Engineering Mechanics from Michigan Technological University in 1987 in the area of mechanics. He was appointed to his present post at the School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering at Washington State University (WSU) in 1988, and was promoted to the rank of Professor in August 1998.
Professor Zbib's research focused on investigating the thermo-mechanical behavior of materials, and addresses engineering and scientific phenomena at various length scales and extreme conditions. On the smaller end of the length scale spectrum (micrometer to sub-nanometer), his work aimed at understanding the physical characteristics and performance of nano-metallic structures and new generation of nano-composites for use in nano-thermo-fluidic-mechanical systems, microelectronics, and medical devices. On the larger end of the scale, he investigated the behavior of inorganic and geological materials under extreme conditions, such as shockwaves, high speed metal forming, as well as earthquake and soil engineering. His work had been continuously funded by many agencies, including the US National Science foundation, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the US National Institute of Standard and Technology, Sandia National Laboratory, the US Department of Energy, to name a few. He is the author and editor of 12 books and over 180 technical articles which have been published in physics, mechanics and engineering journals.
Professor Zbib was the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Engineering Materials and Technology. He served on a number of editorial boards, including the International Journal of Plasticity, the Journal of Metallurgical and Materials Transactions A, the Materials Science Research International, Japan, the Revue de Mécanique Appliquée et Théorique, and the Morocco Society of Mechanics Science.
Professor Zbib received many international awards and recognitions. To name a few, he was a Fellow member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineer, he was elected to the Academy of Mechanical Engineering and Engineering Mechanics of Michigan Tech University in 2003, and in the same year he was the recipient of the international Mechanics Achievement Award from the Japanese Society of Mechanical Engineers.
Professor Zbib was a founding member of the ASL. He passed away on February 10, 2020.
Sample of Academician's Research:
Defect-free channel in deformed irradiated Cu.
Weak-beam dark-field
transmission electron microscope image shows defect-free channels formed during deformation of Cu irradiated with 600-MeV protons.The irradiation of metals by energetic particles causes significant degradation of the mechanical properties. Such effects limit the lifetime of pressure vessels in nuclear power plants, and constrain the choice of materials for fusion-based alternative energy sources. In a 2000 Nature article Prof. Zbib and co-workers used three-dimensional multiscale simulations of irradiated metals to reveal the mechanisms underlying plastic flow localization in defect-free channels. They observed dislocation pinning by irradiation-induced clusters of defects, and found that the width of the plastic flow channels is limited by the interaction among opposing dislocation dipole segments and the remaining defect clusters.
Sir Michael Atiyah
(d. 2019)
Sir Michael Atiyah was born in London in 1929. He was educated at Victoria College in Cairo, Manchester Grammar School and Cambridge University (PhD in Mathematics 1955).
His first posts were in Cambridge, but he then moved to Oxford and became Savilian Professor of Geometry. In 1969, he was appointed Professor at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton before returning to Oxford as Royal Society Research Professor. In 1990, he went back to Cambridge as Master of Trinity College and Director of the newly formed Isaac Newton institute for Mathematical Science.
Sir Michael was a mathematician who worked in the general area of Geometry, especially in topology, differential geometry and algebraic geometry. His work involved links with analysis and has found significant applications in modern physics. He was active in encouraging interaction between mathematicians and theoretical physicists. His collected works in 6 volumes were published by Oxford University Press. He had more than 50 research students of whom 6 have been elected as Fellows of the Royal Society.He was President of the Royal Society of London (1990-95), President of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs (1997-2002), and was elected President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in October 2005. From 1995-2005, he was Chancellor of the University of Leicester.
He held honorary degrees from more than 30 universities (including Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, the American University of Beirut and the Lebanese University) and was a foreign member of over 20 national academies including the French Académie des Sciences, the US National Academy of Sciences and the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Sir Michael received many medals and prizes including the Fields Medal in 1966 and the Abel Prize in 2004.
He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1983 and was made a member of the Order of Merit in 1992. He was also a Commander of the Order of the Cedars and held the gold medal of merit of the Lebanon.
Sir Michael Atiyah was a founding member of the ASL. He passed away on January 11, 2019.
Sample of Academician’s Research
A twisted cubic curve, the subject of Atiyah's first paper.
Atiyah's early papers on algebraic geometry (and some general papers) are reprinted in the first volume of his collected works.
As an undergraduate, Atiyah was interested in classical projective geometry, and wrote his first paper: a short note on twisted cubics. He started research under W. V. D. Hodge and won the Smith's prize for 1954 for a sheaf-theoretic approach to ruled surfaces, which encouraged Atiyah to continue in mathematics, rather than switch to his other interests: architecture & archaeology.Dr. Moustafa Chahine
(d. 2011)
Dr. Moustafa Chahine was Science Team Leader for NASA’s Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS), which was launched onboard the Aqua spacecraft in 2002. He received his PhD in 1960 from the University of California at Berkeley. At JPL, he has served as founding head of the Division of Earth and Space Sciences and as the Laboratory’s Chief Scientist until 2001. Dr. Chahine’s primary interests were in remote sensing of planetary atmospheres and surfaces, and in climate change processes. He was credited with the development of the analytical “Relaxation” method for inverse solution of the radiative transfer equation. He has also developed a multispectral method using infrared and microwave observations to enable infrared remote sensing through clouds. These methods were applied to the remote sensing of Earth, Venus Mars and Jupiter. In later years, he developed the “Vanishing Partial Derivatives” method to retrieve the mixing ratio of Carbon Dioxide and other minor gases in the troposphere and in the boundary layer. Dr. Chahine served as a member of NASA’s Earth System Sciences Committee and as chair of the World Meteorological Organization’s Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment (GEWEX) Science Steering Group from 1989-1999.
Dr. Chahine was a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the International Academy of Astronautics, and a Fellow in the American Physical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Geophysical Union and the American and British Meteorological Societies. He has received NASA’s Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal (1969), Outstanding Leadership, and Exceptional Achievement Medals. He was also a recipient of the William T. Pecora Award from NASA and the U.S. Department of the Interior, the Jule G. Charney Award of the American Meteorological Society, the Losey Atmospheric Sciences Award of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the William Nordberg Medal from the Committee on Space Research (COSPAR), the NASA Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievements (2007), and the SPIE 2010 George W. Goddard Award.Dr. Chahine was elected to the ASL in 2010 "For his leadership in the theoretical modeling and space observation of Earth & planetary atmospheres."
Dr. Moustafa Chahine passed away on March 23rd, 2011.
