Ambati Receives 2014 SEC Faculty Achievement Award

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (April 11, 2014) – Dr. Jayakrishna Ambati, professor and vice chair of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences in the University of Kentucky College of Medicine has been named one of 14 recipients of the 2014 SEC Faculty Achievement Awards. The annual awards recognize a faculty member from every SEC university who demonstrates outstanding records of teaching, research and scholarship.

To be eligible for the SEC Faculty Achievement Award, a professor must be a teacher or scholar at an SEC university; have achieved the rank of full professor at an SEC university; have a record of extraordinary teaching; and a record of scholarship that is recognized nationally and/or internationally.

Since Ambati's arrival at UK in 2001, he has made significant contributions to the University as a teacher, physician-scientist, and researcher. His published studies appear in top-tier journals such as, Cell, Nature, and the New England Journal of Medicine. On a national and international level, Ambati and his team are perhaps most noted for groundbreaking discoveries and contributions to the body of knowledge related to Age Related Macular Degeneration.

Ambati's research has led to numerous coveted physician-scientist awards such as the Doris Duke Distinguished Clinical Scientist Award, the Burroughs Wellcome Fund Translational Research Clinical Scientist Award, the Ellison Medical Foundation Senior Scholar in Aging, the Prix Soubrane de la Recherehe en Ophthalmalogie in Paris, France, for his contributions to research in age-related macular degeneration, and the Mark Brothers Award from the Indiana University School of Medicine.  Additionally, he was recently inducted as a member of Club Jules Gonin, which is regarded as the most exclusive society of retina physicians and surgeons in the world.

“The 2014 SEC Faculty Achievement Award winners are some of our nation’s most accomplished instructors, researchers and scholars,” said Dr. Jay Gogue, President of Auburn University and President of the Southeastern Conference. “It is my great pleasure to preside over an intercollegiate athletics conference that not only recognizes their work, but strives to support it as well.”

SEC Faculty Achievement Award winners receive a $5,000 honorarium from the Southeastern Conference and become his or her university’s nominee for the SEC Professor of the Year Award. The SEC Professor of the Year, to be named later this month, receives an additional $15,000 honorarium and will be recognized at the SEC Spring Meetings in May and the SEC Symposium in September.

SEC Commissioner Mike Slive said, “These 14 professors positively represent the breadth and depth of education in the Southeastern Conference, and I want to congratulate each of them. The commitment to their students, universities and communities is truly commendable.”

Selected by a committee of SEC Provosts, the SEC Faculty Achievement Awards and the SEC Professor of the Year Award are part of SECU, the academic initiative of the Southeastern Conference, which sponsors, supports and promotes collaborative higher education programs and activities involving administrators, faculty and students at its 14 member universities.

Below is a complete list of the 2014 SEC Faculty Achievement Award recipients.

• University of Alabama, Dr. George Rable, Charles Summersell Chair of Southern History
• University of Arkansas, Dr. Carol Reeves, Cecil and Gwendolyn Cupp Applied Professorship in Entrepreneurship
• Auburn University, Dr. Geoffrey Hill, Professor and Curator of Birds, Department of Biological Sciences
• University of Florida, Dr. Peter Hirschfeld, Professor of Physics
• University of Georgia, Dr. Gregory Robinson, Foundation Distinguished Professor of Chemistry
• University of Kentucky, Dr. Jayakrishna Ambati, Professor and Vice Chair of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences
• Louisiana State University, Dr. Mark Batzer, Dr. Mary Lou Applewhite Distinguished Professor
• University of Mississippi, Dr. John Hall, Arthur C. Guyton Professor and Chair of Physiology and Biophysics
• Mississippi State University, Dr. Hossein Toghiani, Thomas B. Nusz Endowed Professor of Chemical Engineering
• University of Missouri, Dr. Judy Wall, Curator’s Professor in Biochemistry
• University of South Carolina, Dr. Kenneth Reifsnider, University Professor of Mechanical Engineering
• University of Tennessee, Dr. Daniel Simberloff, Nancy Gore Hunger Professor of Environmental Studies

UK Media Contact:  Ann Blackford, ann.blackford@uky.edu