After years of waiting and wishing, Duke has finally snagged its first Nobel laureate.
Dr. Peter Agre, winner of the 2003 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, will join the Duke University Medical Center in July as the first vice chancellor for science and technology. The position—created by Dr. Victor Dzau, chancellor for health affairs and CEO and president of Duke University Health System—is unique among medical centers and is designed to bolster Duke’s efforts in scientific education and health policy.
“Duke wants to be a major player in the national scene in science and technology,” said Dzau, who appointed Agre. “Too many universities are relatively silent on so many issues that are important to the future of our society.”
Agre noted that his move to Duke from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine is a “career shift.” Concerned about American people’s dwindling enthusiasm for science and math, Agre said his interests have gradually shifted from pure research to the policy realm. He plans to work with the local community and national science coalitions to educate students and the general population about health care issues.
Citing stem cell research, Agre said the scientific community has faltered in explaining the increasingly complicated science behind health care. “We’re concerned that people are not really competent to take these facts in,” he said. In the United States the populace will make choices about future standards, and Agre wants the scientific community to set out information that allows for an “ethical middle ground” that considers the science rather than “dogmatic decisions.”
Agre, 55, began his career as a physician, but the potential discoveries of science research lured him into the laboratory full time. He spent most of his medical career at Johns Hopkins and became a full professor of biological chemistry in 1993.
In 2003, he shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for discovering the molecular basis for how water moves into and out of cells. He and Johns Hopkins physiologist Bill Guggino found the first water-channel protein, aquaporin, that helps water molecules move through the cell membrane. Since the 1992 discovery, Agre has found aquaporins to be part of the blood-brain barrier and associated with water transport in skeletal muscle, lungs and kidneys.
Agre will move a pared-down version of his laboratory to Duke and will continue his research, but his primary work will be as a public spokesperson for scientific issues and an architect for Duke’s future medical research enterprise. Echoing Dzau’s own priorities for the Medical Center, Agre emphasized the importance of translating basic science research into real-world applications. He is currently exploring how his own research might help alleviate health problems such as malaria or osteoporosis.
As a Nobel laureate—the only one on Duke’s faculty—Agre is positioned to influence the larger community and expand the scope of university-based research. “Being a laureate has opened doors,” he said. “It doesn’t mean that people will change their minds.”
In addition to serving as an advocate for science, Agre will work with elementary and high school teachers to develop inspirational teaching strategies. He will also help the University recruit other top scientists, particularly those concerned with practical applications of their research.
Agre, who worked at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill at the start of his career, said he considered moving to Duke about five years ago, but the timing made it infeasible. When he recently encountered Dzau at a meeting, he wanted to help Duke develop what Dzau called a “global vision about how to get people more excited about science and math.” Agre said the potential Duke offered him to advocate new policy strategies helped draw him back to North Carolina.
He will begin a six-month sabbatical at Duke immediately and will step into his new position July 1.
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