Scott Bailey, an associate professor at the Bloomberg School of Public Health, recently won the second annual Johns Hopkins University President’s Frontier Award. The $250,000 award is given to members of the Hopkins community who have had a major impact on the fields of science and technology.
University President Ronald J. Daniels and Provost Robert C. Lieberman surprised Bailey with the award in his lab.
The Frontier Award is different than many other science and technology grants because it not only recognizes the lifetime achievements of the winner, but focuses on their future potential in the field. Awarding this money was made possible by alumni Louis J. Forster and alumna Kathleen M. Pike.
“This award is to just dream and follow wherever curiosity leads him in advancing his research agenda,” Daniels said in an article on the HUB. “This is a vote of confidence in knowing the best is yet to come.”
Bailey is also affiliated with the Bloomberg School’s Malaria Research Institute. Receiving the award surprised him, and Bailey is already thinking of ways his team can use the money. He emphasized to the HUB that because the award is not funded by the government, there will be more freedom for discovery.
“It’s phenomenal,” Bailey said. “It’s very sort of Hopkins in the sense that it is like a family here. I feel it at all levels, from the department to the school to the university.”
Bailey works at the edges of scientific knowledge to understand at the molecular level how bacteria’s immune systems fight off the threat posed by harmful viruses, according to the HUB. His colleagues commented on his willingness to help students and be a mentor to them.
Besides Bailey’s $250,000 award, three Hopkins finalists are being awarded $50,000 to fund their research and scientific developments. These finalists are Xin Chen, an associate professor of biology in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences; Michael Hersch, a composer and pianist on the faculty of the Peabody Conservatory; and Shanthini Sockanathan, a professor of neuroscience in the School of Medicine.
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