Orten Lectureship

Dr. James M. Orten was a respected faculty member in the Department of Biochemistry from 1937 until his retirement in 1975, when he continued as Professor Emeritus of Biochemistry until his death on March 2, 1991. He was an excellent teacher and was popular among students. He was well known for his text books in biochemistry and for his research in the areas of porphyrin-heme biosynthesis, nutrition and intermediary metabolism. For his contributions, Dr. Orten was elected a Fellow of the American Institute of Nutrition. Dr. Aline U. Orten received her Ph.D. in biochemistry from Yale University in 1937 and came to the Wayne State University School of Medicine later that year as an instructor of physiological chemistry. Over the next half-century, the Ortens served as dedicated members of the Wayne State community. The James M. Orten Memorial Fund was established through the generous donations of Dr. Aline U. Orten, as well as friends of the Ortens. The fund was created to benefit graduate and postdoctoral students in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. It allows the graduate students and postdoctoral associates to invite a renowned researcher in the field of biochemistry and molecular biology to present the James M. Orten Lecture. In addition it gives them an opportunity to meet with and interact personally with an internationally renown scientist. Upon her death on February 16, 2000, the fund was renamed the Aline U. and James M. Orten Memorial Lecture to honor both Drs. Orten.

More details will be posted at a later date regarding the 2022/2023 Orten Lecture.

Previous Orten Lecturers

2018

Bruce Beutler, M.D.
Professor and Director, 2011 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine
UT Southwestern Medical Center
Using high speed forward genetics to study immunity in mice.
October 10th, 2018

2017

Michael Levin, Ph.D.
Professor of Biology
Vannevar Bush Chair
Director, Allen Discovery Center at Tufts
Tufts Center for Regenerative and Developmental Biology
Rewriting bioelectrical pattern memories for the control of growth and form: exploiting somatic primitive cognition for regenerative medicine.

2016

Giulio Tononi, M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Psychiatry
Distinguished Professor in Consciousness Science
David P. White Chair in Sleep Medicine at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
Director of the Wisconsin Institute for Sleep and Consciousness

2014-2015

Eric F. Wieschaus, Ph.D., Nobel Laureate
Squibb Professor of Molecular Biology
Princeton University
The mechanics of cell shape change during embryonic development.
View images from the lecture.

Bernhard Ø. Palsson, Ph.D.
Galletti Professor of Bioengineering, Professor of Pediatrics
Principal Investigator of the Systems Biology Research Group in the Department of Bioengineering
University of California, San Diego

2013
Dr. Leroy Hood, M.D., Ph.D.
President and co-founder, Institute of System Biology
A systems approach to disease: Catalyzing emerging technologies and Proactive P4 medicine" - Predictive, Preventive, Personalized and Participatory.

2012
Dr. Lewis E. Kay, Ph.D.
The University of Toronto
Seeing the Invisible by solution NMR Spectroscopy

2009
Roland Lill, Ph.D.
Institut für Zytobiologie
Philipps-Universität Marburg
Biogenesis of iron-sulfur proteins in eukaryotes

2008
Michael G. Rossman, Ph.D.
Purdue University
Structure and function of Dengue virus and other Flaviviruses

2007
Kurt Wüthrich, PhD., Nobel Laureate
ETH, Zürich and the Scripps Research Inst.
Structural Biology and structural genomics using NMR

2006
Douglas C. Reese, Ph.D.
California Institute of Technology
Structural studies of ABC transporters

2004-2005
Brian W. Matthews, Ph.D., D.Sc.
University of Oregon
Tolerance and intolerance in protein structure and function

2003
H. Ronald Kaback, M.D
University of California Los Angeles
From membranes to molecules: mechanisms of active transport

2002
Peter C. Agre, M.D., Nobel Laureate
The Johns Hopkins University
Aquaporin water channel proteins: from atomic structure to clinical medicine

2001
Jeffrey M. Friedman, M.D., Ph.D.
Rockefeller University
Leptin and the endocrine control of body weight

2000
Sir John E. Walker, Ph.D., Nobel Laureate
Medical Research Council
Cambridge, England
The rotary mechanism of ATP synthase

1999
Stanley Prusiner, M.D., Nobel Laureate
University of California San Francisco
The saga of prion diseases

1998
Richard Palmiter, Ph.D.
University of Washington
Genetics of appetite and obesity

1997
Richard Hanson. Ph.D.
Case Western Reserve University
Genetic control of the development of glucose homeostasis

1996
Carolyn Berdanier, Ph.D.
University of Georgia
Diabetes: a mitochondrial genomic defect?

1995
M. Daniel Lane, Ph.D.
The Johns Hopkins University
Transcriptional control of adiposite Differentiation

1994
David Kritchevsky, Ph.D.
Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
Nutrition and artherosclerosis: everything counts

1993
Hector DeLuca, Ph.D.
University of Wisconsin
The molecular mechanism of action of 1,25dihydroxyvitamin D3