Of the 5 UC staff elected 2 are located at ZSFG!
5 UCSF Faculty Elected to the National Academy of Medicine for 2015
By Jyoti Madhusoodanan on October 19, 2015
Five UC San Francisco faculty members are among the 70 new members elected to the National Academy of Medicine (NAM), formerly known as the Institute of Medicine (IOM).
The 70 new regular members and 10 international members were announced at the institute's 45th annual meeting on Monday.
The announcement recognizes individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the fields of health and medicine, and is considered one of the highest honors in these disciplines. The most recent UCSF members to join this distinguished group are:
- Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, PhD, MD, MAS, professor of medicine, epidemiology, and biostatistics and Lee Goldman Endowed Chair in Medicine
- Andrew B. Bindman, MD, professor of medicine, epidemiology, and biostatistics
- Atul Butte, MD, PhD, director of the Institute for Computational Health Sciences; executive director of Clinical Informatics for UC Health Sciences and Services and professor of pediatrics
- Tejal A. Desai, PhD, professor and chair of the Department of Bioengineering and Therapeutic Sciences in the School of Pharmacy and School of Medicine
- Shinya Yamanaka, MD, PhD, professor of anatomy
With Monday’s announcement, a total of 97 people from UCSF are now members of the NAM.
“These five new members represent an amazing diversity of research and contributions to global health and science, and I am proud of each one of them,” said Talmadge E. King, Jr., MD, dean of the UCSF School of Medicine.

Bibbins-Domingo has previously served on many IOM committees, and was appointed vice chair of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, an independent panel of national experts in prevention and evidence-based medicine, in March 2014.


With a rare expertise that spans biomedical research as well as computer science, Butte has received several prestigious awards, including the 2014 E. Mead Johnson Award from the Society for Pediatric Research, 2013 National Academy of Sciences Kavli Frontiers Fellowship and 2013 Champion of Change in Open Science awarded by the White House.


Prior to the Nobel, Yamanaka has received several other honors, including the Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award, the Wolf Prize in Medicine, the Shaw Prize and the Kyoto Prize for Advanced Technology. In 2011, Yamanaka was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.
“Our newly elected members represent the brightest, most influential, and passionate people in health, science, and medicine in our nation and internationally,” said Victor J. Dzau, president of the NAM, which earlier this year assumed membership, honorific and other functions formerly administered by the IOM, while the IOM continues its consensus study and convening activities.
“They are at the top of their fields and are committed to service," Dzau said. "The expertise they bring to the organization will help us respond to today’s most pressing health-related challenges and inform the future of health, science and medicine."