Department Scientist Receives High Honor
Albany, May 7, 1999 -- One of the highest honors accorded a scientist -- membership in the National Academy of Sciences -- has been bestowed upon Marlene Belfort, Ph.D., a Department of Health research scientist and director of the division of genetic disorders in the Wadsworth Center laboratories. She was one of 60 scientists elected "in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research" at the Academy's annual meeting, held Tuesday, April 27, 1999 in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Belfort studies genetic elements known as introns, segments of DNA that interrupt genes and can therefore disrupt the flow of genetic information. Genes are the units of heredity. They are composed of sequences that code for proteins, the molecular workhorses of life, and non-coding sequences with no apparent function. These non-coding sequences are introns. Introns are also mobile, and when they migrate into functional human genes, they can cause DNA rearrangements that lead to congenital abnormalities or some cancers. Dr. Belfort investigates the dynamic process by which introns move.
"Research has been integral to the mission of our laboratories since they were founded in 1914, a tradition that today continues in the era of molecular genetics," said Dennis Whalen, Acting Commissioner of Health. "We are extremely proud that so respected a body as the Academy has honored one of our senior scientists."
The National Academy of Sciences is a private organization dedicated to the furtherance of science and its use for the general welfare. The Academy was established in 1863 by a Congressional act of incorporation, signed by Abraham Lincoln, that calls on the Academy to act as an official adviser to the federal government in any matter of science and technology. There are 1,825 active members. Dr. Belfort is one of only 133 women members, and one of fewer than 200 members assigned to the biochemistry section.
New York State holds the distinction of being the only state health department with a National Academy of Sciences member. A former director of the laboratories, the late Dr. Gilbert Dalldorf, was elected to the Academy in 1955. Wadsworth Center is also the only state laboratory with a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator, another of the biomedical research community's highest honors.
Dr. Belfort received a doctorate in molecular biology at the University of California at Irvine in 1972, and then pursued postdoctoral studies at Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical School, Jerusalem, and Northwestern University. She joined the health department as a research scientist in 1978, and was named chief of the laboratory of developmental genetics and director, division of genetic disorders, in 1994.
The body of work for which Dr. Belfort was honored is based on the discovery at Wadsworth Center some 15 years ago that, contrary to then current opinion, introns exist in simple organisms such as bacteria. Her studies run the gamut from answering fundamental questions about how introns function through how they evolved. She and her colleagues also investigate inteins, another type of intervening sequence. Dr. Belfort, whose studies are supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health and who has published more than 100 papers in prestigious journals, holds patents for how introns and inteins can be exploited in biotechnology.
"Marlene has done outstanding science on the biology of mobile genetic elements in bacteria...These elements may be related to introns in human genes and understanding their biology is important," said Dr. Phillip A. Sharp, Nobel Prize winner for his discovery of introns and professor of biology at MIT's Center for Cancer Research.
Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1994, Dr. Belfort serves on the editorial board of several scientific journals and is an advisor to the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research. She is a professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences at the School of Public Health-University at Albany, and an adjunct professor in the university's Department of Biological Sciences.
5/7/99-46 OPA