Kornbluth Named Vice Provost for Academic Affairs

Sally Kornbluth has been named Duke University's vice provost for academic affairs, Provost Peter Lange announced Wednesday.She succeeds John D. Simon, who left the post to become provost at the University of Virginia.

Kornbluth is the James B. Duke Professor in the department of pharmacology and cancer biology and the vice dean for research in the Duke University School of Medicine. She joined the Duke faculty in 1994.

"I am most pleased that Sally has agreed to become vice provost for academic affairs," said Lange. "She brings a wealth of experience in overseeing academic research and programs in the Medical School and the basic sciences, and a superb research record of her own, as well as being a superb collaborator as we have developed academic collaborations between the campus and the medical school. She has tremendous energy and vision and I am confident she will be a wonderful member of our team."

Kornbluth was appointed vice dean for basic sciences at the medical school in 2006 and became the vice dean for research in 2009. In that role, she served as a liaison between the medical school dean's office and the basic science chairs and faculty. She also was responsible for oversight of site-based clinical research, core laboratories and the biomedical graduate programs in the medical school, implementing programs to support the research mission of the faculty and participating in recruitment decisions.

"I'm very excited for the opportunity to work with Provost Lange to enhance cross-school collaborations, develop academic initiatives and further improve the research infrastructure," Kornbluth said.Her own research is focused on the signals that tell a cell to start dividing or to self-destruct, both key processes for understanding cancer and degenerative disorders. In January of this year, she was named a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

As vice provost for academic affairs, Kornbluth will provide strategic planning and administrative oversight for campus-wide initiatives in science and engineering and foster collaborations among the Trinity College of Arts and Sciences, the Pratt School of Engineering, the Nicholas School of the Environment and the School of Medicine.

Kornbluth received a bachelor of arts degree in political science from Williams College in 1982 and a bachelor of science in genetics from Cambridge University, England, in 1984, where she was a Herchel Smith Scholar at Emmanuel College. She received her Ph.D. from the Rockefeller University in 1989 in molecular oncology and went on to postdoctoral training at the University of California, San Diego.