Brenda Schulman, Ph.D., Recognized as 2012 Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital scientist named to prestigious honorary society

MEMPHIS, Tenn., April 17, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Brenda Schulman, Ph.D., of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, has been named to the 2012 class of new Fellows and Foreign Honorary Members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS). Schulman was elected for her lab's work on understanding a major form of cellular regulation, namely how ubiquitin-like proteins are conjugated to their target.

Founded in 1780, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences is an honorary society and independent policy research center. Members contribute to Academy publications and studies of science and technology policy, energy and global security, social policy and American institutions, the humanities and culture, and education.

Schulman joined St. Jude in 2001 and is currently a member of the Structural Biology Department. She is also co-director of the St. Jude Molecular Oncology Program. Schulman studies a family of enzymes known as ubiquitin-like proteins that help regulate cell division. Cancers are among the diseases that arise when this process is disrupted. Studies by her laboratory have led the way in understanding the structure and function of ubiquitin-like enzymes.

Schulman, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, has been named a Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences, earned a Beckman Young Investigator Award and received the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers from former President George W. Bush. She was also a joint winner of The Protein Society's Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin Award in 2011.

Throughout its history, AAAS has elected leaders from each generation, including George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Albert Einstein and Winston Churchill. The current membership includes more than 250 Nobel laureates and more than 60 Pulitzer Prize winners.

Among the new class are winners of the Pulitzer and Shaw prizes; the Fields Medal; the Kennedy Center Honors; Grammy, Emmy, Academy and Tony awards; and elected members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The new class will be inducted at a ceremony in October at the Academy's headquarters in Cambridge, Mass.

This is the second year St. Jude has been honored by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Martine Roussel, Ph.D., also of St. Jude, was named a Fellow in 2011.

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital

Since opening 50 years ago, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital has changed the way the world treats childhood cancer and other life-threatening diseases. No family ever pays St. Jude for the care their child receives and, for every child treated here, thousands more have been saved worldwide through St. Jude discoveries. The hospital has played a pivotal role in pushing U.S. pediatric cancer survival rates from 20 to 80 percent overall, and is the first and only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center devoted solely to children. It is also a leader in the research and treatment of blood disorders and infectious diseases in children. St. Jude was founded by the late entertainer Danny Thomas, who believed that no child should die in the dawn of life. To learn more, visit www.stjude.org. Follow us on Twitter @StJudeResearch.

SOURCE St. Jude Children's Research Hospital