Distinguished alumni honored

The Distinguished Alumni Award is the highest honor the Institute bestows on a graduate, and is in recognition of a particular achievement of noteworthy value, a series of such achievements, or a career of noteworthy accomplishment. This year’s awards will be presented on Saturday, May 21, during the annual Alumni Reunion Weekend and Seminar Day. This year’s recipients are:

Mark M. Davis
PhD ’81, Biology
Davis, the Avery Professor of Immunology at Stanford University, has been devoted to the study of T lymphocytes, a major component of the body’s immune system. His discovery and characterization of T-cell receptor genes opened the way to understanding how these molecules recognize foreign antigens.

Leonard A. Herzenberg
PhD ’56, Biology
In the 1960s, Herzenberg conceived and oversaw the development of the fluorescence activated cell sorter (FACS), the first of a series of flow cytometry instruments that have become essential tools in biology and medicine. Since that time, he has continued to develop new FACS capabilities, and is credited with making flow cytometry available to genetic and immunologic studies.

Wilton W. Webster
BS ’49, Mechanical Engineering
Wilton Webster is the senior science advisor at Biosense Webster, the cardiovascular catheter company he founded in 1969. Some 10 years later, the development of electrophysiology (the study of electrical activity in the heart ) gave rise to the curing of patients with heart arrhythmias by radio-frequency ablation using catheters. Webster subsequently further modified his catheters for use in this emerging field.

Raymond L. Orbach
BS ’56, Physics
Orbach is the director of the Office of Science at the Department of Energy, the third-largest federal sponsor of basic research in the United States. Before assuming this post, he had served for 10 years as chancellor of the University of California, Riverside. While there, enrollment at UC Riverside grew from 8,805 to more than 14,400 students. In addition to his administrative duties at Riverside, Orbach maintained an active research program in theoretical and experimental physics.

Gordon H. Sato
PhD ’56, Biology
Best known for his contribution to the understanding of the multiple factors required for the culture and husbandry of mammalian cells outside the body, Sato exemplifies the nontraditional student. In 1950, he was working as a gardener near the Caltech campus, when he walked onto campus and ended up being interviewed by Nobel Laureate Max Delbrück, who recognized his potential and took him on as a graduate student.
After completing his PhD, Sato held a number of academic positions, founded several biotechnology ventures, and in the early 1980s codeveloped the cancer drug Erbitux. Today he devotes himself entirely to helping alleviate famine in Ethiopia.

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