Eleven professors have been promoted to the rank of University of New Mexico distinguished professor, the highest rank bestowed on faculty. Distinguished professors are individuals who have demonstrated outstanding achievements and are nationally and internationally renowned as scholars.
The 2006-2007 inductees are:
Jonathan Abrams, M.D.
Jonathan Abrams, M.D., cardiology, is a board certified specialist in internal medicine and cardiovascular disease. He received his medical degree from the University of California Medical School in San Francisco. He has served as Chief of Cardiology, authored numerous books, articles, chapters and abstracts. Abrams is a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology, American College of Physicians and the American Heart Association Council on Clinical Cardiology.
Abrams initiated the cardiovascular fellowship program, in which over 100 cardiologists have been trained at UNM since 1972. In addition to medicine, Abrams is active in contemporary art activities at UNM, and New Mexico. He has curated four exhibitions at the UNM Art Museum.
Keith H. Basso
Keith H. Basso, anthropology, studies language and culture. He has done fieldwork in Australia and the American Southwest. Basso’s fieldwork includes a long- term relationship with the Western Apache community of Cibecue, which began in 1959 and is still exists today. He received his bachelor’s magna cum laude from Harvard University and his Ph. D. from Stanford University.
Basso was a Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, N. J., and the Weatherhead Fellow at the School of American Research at Santa Fe. He has written and edited many books for which he has received the Western States Book Award for Creative Nonfiction, the Victor Turner Prize for Ethnographic Writing, and other awards. Basso is a UNM Regents’ Professor.
Steven Brueck
Steven Brueck, electrical and computer engineering, physics, and director of the Center for High Technology Materials, is the author of 350 articles. He is among UNM’s leading patent holders, with 30 to his name. CHTM, under Brueck’s direction for two decades, has grown to an internationally recognized center for nanoscience, optoelectronics and microelectronics research. Brueck earned both masters and doctoral degrees in electrical engineering from MIT, is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and is an Outstanding Researcher in the School of Engineering.
Carlton Caves
Carlton Caves, physics and astronomy, received his Ph.D. in physics from the California Institute of Technology. His areas of expertise include physics of information, quantum information theory, quantum chaos, quantum optics, theory of nonclassical light, theory of quantum noise and quantum theory measurement.
Caves is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He received the Einstein Prize for Laser Science from the Society for Optical and Quantum Electronics and has three times been awarded for Excellence in Teaching at UNM.
Judith Chazin-Bennahum
Judith Chazin-Bennahum, theatre and dance, is a teacher, researcher and choreographer who danced in companies with Robert Joffrey, Agnes De Mille and The Santa Fe Opera Ballet. She was principal soloist with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet Company and was invited by George Balanchine to join the New York City Ballet on their first trip to Russia and danced in numerous modern dance companies in New York.
Chazin-Bennahum received her doctorate in Romance Languages at UNM, and is the author of many articles and books. She served as President of the Society of Dance History Scholars. She received the Bravo Award for Life Time Excellence in Dance in 2002 from the Albuquerque Arts Alliance. This year she was elected to the Board of Directors of the largest dance studies organization Congress on Research in Dance.
Steven Gangestad
Steven Gangestad, psychology, conducts interdisciplinary research in evolutionary psychology. He works to understand sexual and romantic relationships within an evolutionary psychological framework. He also examines individual differences from an evolutionary genetic standpoint, causes of variation in brain development and function, hormones and behavior and meta-theory in psychology. He has more than 100 peer-reviewed to his name and is currently president-elect of the Human Behavior and Evolution Society. Gangestad earned his PhD from the University of Minnesota and was a Regents’ Lecturer in 1999.
Fred Hashimoto
Fred Hashimoto, medicine, graduated from Yale and earned his medical degree at Harvard. Board certified in Internal Medicine and Family Practice, he has had a large panel of patients. Academic interests include computer simulation of operational processes and high altitude physiology.
Hashimoto has been Chief of the Medical Staff and is Director of Medical Informatics at the School of Medicine. Awards include Health Sciences Center Service Award, Distinguished Service Award from the Department of Medicine, HSC Vice-President’s Extra Mile Award and Medicine Attending of the Year Award. He has served several terms on the UNM Faculty Senate and has been on its Operations committee. He is a University Hospital trustee and is on the UNM president search committee. He has been on the Athletic Council and is on the steering committee for the Coalition on Intercollegiate Athletics.
Paul Andrew Hutton
Paul Andrew Hutton, history, has received numerous awards for his writing including the Billington Prize from the Organization of American Historians, the Evans Biography Award and the Spur Award from the Western Writers of America, for whom he served as president. His article on Roosevelt’s Rough Riders won Hutton one of his many Western Heritage Awards. He has written scripts for the History Channel and a dozen television documentaries. He has appeared on more than 150 television programs. He co-wrote and co-produced five episodes of the History Channel series Investigating History.
Ruth Luckasson
Ruth Luckasson, J.D., is a Regents’ Professor and Professor of Special Education in the College of Education, where she is chair of Educational Specialties. She is past president of the American Association on Mental Retardation. Luckasson currently serves on the Board of Trustees of the Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law and the Arc-US Legal Rights and Advocacy Committee.
She previously served on the President’s Committee on Mental Retardation, and chair of the American Bar Association’s Commission on Mental and Physical Disability Law. Luckasson is faculty director of the Albuquerque Public Schools/UNM Partnership Program in Mental Retardation and Severe Disabilities. She has published widely in the areas of special education and community living for individuals with cognitive disabilities. She is author or co-author of many books and articles.
Tey Diana Rebolledo
Tey Diana Rebolledo, Regents Professor, Department of Spanish and Portuguese, received her master’s in Latin American Studies at UNM and a Ph.D. in Spanish from the University of Arizona. She received the Lifetime Achievement Award for Scholarship in Chicana Literature from the Multi-Ethnic Society of the U.S., the Critica Nueva Award for Chicano/a Literature, Distinguished Professor from the Modern Language Association, a Fellow in the Liguria Study Center for the Arts and Humanities, among other awards.
Rebolledo has published extensively, presented more than 60 invited lectures, 40 scholarly papers, served on 15 panels and served as a curriculum consultant, outside evaluator of university programs and a literary judge.
Howard Waitzkin
Howard Waitzkin, sociology, Family and Community Medicine and Internal Medicine, earned his doctorate in sociology as well as his medical degree from Harvard with clinical training as resident and fellow at Stanford and Massachusetts General Hospital. His work focuses on health policy in comparative international perspective and on psychosocial issues in primary care. He co-authored the proposal for a single-payer national health program.
He has been an advocate for improved health access and currently conducts studies of Medicaid managed care in New Mexico, the diffusion of managed care to Latin America, and global trade and public health. Waitzkin is a Fulbright New Century Scholar, Fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, recipient of the Leo G. Reeder Award of the American Sociological Association for Distinguished Scholarship in Medical Sociology and the Jonathan Mann Award for Lifetime Commitment to Public Health and Social Justice Issues.
Media Contact: Carolyn Gonzales, (505) 277-5920; e-mail: cgonzal@unm.edu