Christopher Columbus Fellowship Foundation

2012 Life Sciences Chairmen's Distinguished Award

Daniel G. Colley, Ph.D.

Professor of Microbiology and
Director of the Center for Tropical and Emerging Global Diseases
University of Georgia
Athens, Georgia

Dr. Colley is a renowned scientist most notably in the area of tropical medicine and parasitology, with a main focus on the immunology of schistosomiasis, a debilitating, chronic worm disease that affects 240 million people worldwide, in order to control and eliminate it. He has also been heavily involved in reference diagnostics, malaria vaccine development and eradication of dracunculiasis. In his 44-year career, including time at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee, as well as the US Centers for Disease Control, Division of Parasitic Diseases, Dr. Colley established collaborative research laboratories in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, Castries, St. Lucia and Warraq el Arab, Egypt.

In December 2001, he moved to the University of Georgia, in Athens, Georgia. As Director of the Center for Tropical and Emerging Global Diseases and Professor of Microbiology, he directs a cross-college, multi-disciplinary center of 20 investigators who pursue diverse research, largely on parasitic infections. His own research remains focused on the immunology of schistosomiasis.

Dr. Colley has received several awards and honors in his field, such as the Henry Baldwin Ward Medal (American Society of Parasitologists, 1981) and the Bailey K. Ashford Medal (American Society for Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, 1989). In 2005 the President of Brazil presented Dr. Colley with Brazil�s highest scientific honor �Order of Scientific Merit, Class �Gra-Cruz� and in 2008 he was awarded the Piraja da Silva Medal by the Ministry of Health of Brazil for outstanding contributions to the research of schistosomiasis in Brazil. He is an Ambassador in the Paul G. Rogers Society of the Research!America, and an elected Fellow in the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the American Academy of Microbiology.

Dr. Colley has served as President of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (1992-93), and is or has been on numerous editorial boards and many advisory committees and grant review panels for governments, multinationals and foundations.

Dr. Colley has worked extensively in collaborative studies on the immunology of human parasitic infections in Brazil, the West Indies, Egypt and for the last 17 years in Kisumu, Kenya. Most of his research has been on the immunoregulatory checks and balances of the immune responses during these chronic diseases. He has also developed and directs the Schistosomiasis Consortium for Operational Research and Evaluation (SCORE), a major Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation-funded program to ask critical questions about control and elimination of schistosomiasis and to develop the tools needed to pursue these goals globally. The SCORE consortium is comprised of more than 50 investigators, in 26 institutions in 16 countries.

Dr. Colley received his undergraduate degree from Centre College of Kentucky in 1964 and his Ph.D. in Microbiology and Immunology in 1968, from Tulane University. He then pursued two years of post-doctoral training in immunology at Yale University.

Dan Colley is married to the former Mary Paxton Durr and they have one son, Thomas.

The Christopher Columbus Fellowship Foundation is honored to have had the assistance of the following distinguished individuals serving on the 2012 Life Sciences Awards Evaluation Committee:

Russell A. Bantham, Esquire
McLean, VA
Alan Bronstein
Chemistry Teacher (2009 Frieda J. Riley Teacher Award Recipient)
Central High School
Philadelphia, PA
Edward Einstein, Ph.D.
Director & Associate Professor
Center for Advance Research in Biotechnology
University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute
Rockville, Maryland
Christine Leyden
Senior Vice President and Chief Accreditation Officer
URAC
Washington, D.C.