Peter Agre, M.D., winner of the 2003 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, will join the University of Minnesota as a biomedical research adviser to President Eric Kaler, Ph.D., while retaining his full-time appointment as head of the Johns Hopkins University Malaria Research Institute.
Under the one-year, annually renewable agreement, Agre will identify strengths and weaknesses in the University’s biomedical research program, assist in the external review of the Academic Health Center, and identify possible collaborations between U of M faculty and other researchers worldwide, Kaler told the board of regents in June.
A Northfield, Minn., native and Augsburg College graduate, Agre was awarded the Nobel Prize jointly with Roderick MacKinnon, M.D., for discovering “aquaporins,” channels that regulate water molecule transport through cell membranes.
Agre’s unpaid University advisory role was made possible in part by the late Carl Platou, M.H.A. A health care innovator and longtime advocate for the University, Platou had lobbied Agre to assume an advisory role with the University’s new Biomedical Discovery District.
