UCI Foundation gets new chairman

Andrew Edwards

The UC Irvine Foundation announced the election of a new chairman

Monday, the same day a campus professor was selected to lead a

multimillion-dollar study to combat dengue fever.

Douglas Freeman, who lives in Corona del Mar, was chosen to head

the school’s foundation. Trustees on the UC Irvine Foundation seek

private funding for university endeavors.

Freeman has been a member of the foundation’s board since 1999.

“I’d like [UCI] to be recognized for the exceptional quality of

its faculty and students,” Freeman said. “It’s a really extraordinary

university that’s sort of underappreciated.”

UCI, which turns 40 years old this year, may not enjoy as much

fame as UC Berkeley and UCLA, Freeman said. However, Freeman expects

UCI will emerge as a much more well-respected university in the next

two decades.

“It’s giving both those institutions a run for their money,”

Freeman said.

Freeman said he is waiting to confer with incoming Chancellor

Michael V. Drake to set fundraising priorities.

Drake is set to take over the university’s top position Saturday.

Ralph Cicerone, the outgoing chancellor, was elected president of the

National Academy of Sciences.

Important jobs for the foundation include securing money to

recruit faculty to endowed chairs, enhancing financial aid programs

and financing campus construction, said Thomas Mitchell, UCI vice

chancellor of university advancement.

Also on Monday, the Seattle-based Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

announced UCI microbiologist Anthony James had been chosen to lead a

$19.7-million research project to examine the potential for genetic

engineering to be used as a tool against dengue fever.

Dengue fever, according to the Centers for Disease Control and

Prevention, is caused by a mosquito-borne virus.

The disease primarily affects people in tropical urban areas. It

is estimated 50 to 100 million people contract the disease each year.

The grant calls for James to lead research to genetic techniques

that could stop the dengue fever virus from developing in mosquitoes,

hinder mosquitoes from spreading the disease or reduce or destroy

mosquito populations.

“What we hope to provide are potential supplements to existing

approaches to controlling mosquito-borne diseases, such as vaccines

and insecticides, but using genetics as the basis for new tools,”

James said in a statement.