42 faculty honored with Vilas professorships and awards

Extraordinary members of the University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty have been honored during the last year with awards supported by the estate of professor, U.S. senator and UW Regent William F. Vilas (1840-1908).

Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professorships

Ten professors were named to Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professorships, an award recognizing distinguished scholarship as well as standout efforts in teaching and service. The professorship provides five years of flexible funding — two-thirds of which is provided by the Office of the Provost through the generosity of the Vilas trustees and one-third provided by the school or college whose dean nominated the winner.

The recipients are:

David F. Anderson, Mathematics

Stefania Buccini, French and Italian

Pupa Gilbert, Physics

Francine Hirsch, History

Alfonso Morales, Planning and Landscape Architecture

Mitchell Nathan, Educational Psychology

Adam Nelson, Educational Policy Studies

Christine Schwartz, Sociology

Eric Shusta, Chemical and Biological Engineering

Shiyu Zhou, Industrial and Systems Engineering

Vilas Faculty Mid-Career Investigator Awards

Sixteen professors received Vilas Faculty Mid-Career Investigator Awards, recognizing research and teaching excellence. The award provides flexible research funding for one year.

The recipients are:

Kyoung-Shin Choi, Chemistry

Nan Enstad, History

Jason Fletcher, Robert M. La Follette School of Public Affairs

Scott Gehlbach, Political Science

Krishnapuram Karthikeyan, Biological Systems Engineering

Jee-Seon Kim, Educational Psychology

Neil Kodesh, History

Chaeyoon Lim, Sociology

Steven Loheide, Civil and Environmental Engineering

John Orrock, Integrative Biology

Dominic Parker, Agricultural and Applied Economics

Linn Posey-Maddox, Educational Policy Studies

Bulent Sarlioglu, Engineering Professional Development

Margaret Schwarze, Surgery

Douglas Soldat, Soil Science

Weiping Tang, School of Pharmacy

Vilas Faculty Early Career Investigator Awards

Sixteen professors received Vilas Faculty Early Career Investigator Awards, recognizing research and teaching excellence in faculty who are relatively early in their careers. The award provides flexible research funding for one year.

The recipients are:

Thulani Davis, Afro-American Studies

Ramzi Fawaz, English

Andrea Gilmore-Bykovskyi, School of Nursing

Lea Horowitz, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies

Jiaoyang Jiang, School of Pharmacy

Mikhail Kats, Electrical & Computer Engineering

Richard Lankau, Plant Pathology

Qin Li, Mathematics

Kimberly Palladino, Physics

Miriam Seifter, Law School

Eftychios Sifakis, Computer Science

Haley Vlach, Educational Psychology

Yang Wang, Robert M. La Follette School of Public Affairs

Robert Yablon, Law School

Sunny Yudkoff, German, Nordic and Slavic

Xuehua Zhong, Genetics