Celebrating Senior Champions

Grand Champion — Arthur S. Levine, MD

Dr. Levine became Senior Vice Chancellor for the Health Sciences and Dean of the School of Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh in 1998. He was named the John and Gertrude Petersen Dean of Medicine in 2013. He is also Professor of Medicine and Molecular Genetics in the School of Medicine.

The faculty of the University of Pittsburgh ranks fifth nationally in National Institute of Health (NIH) research funding, and Dr. Levine has been instrumental in fostering the University’s remarkable research trajectory. He is a driving force of fundamental research into aging processes at the cellular and subcellular levels. His own molecular biology-based laboratory is focused, in part, on the role of DNA damage in promoting premature aging. With respect to education, Dr. Levine has initiated new mechanisms designed to enhance the recruitment and retention of talented students and trainees with the goal of helping to reverse the precipitous decline across the nation in the numbers of young physicians and other health science students embarking upon substantive careers in research and education. He continues to have a marked influence upon growing the next generations of scientists and clinicians in geriatrics and gerontology and has elevated the profiles of both the University of Pittsburgh and UPMC.

Beyond his University responsibilities, Dr. Levine works closely with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, one of the largest academic medical centers in the U.S., to ensure that health care delivery, biomedical research, and education—the three legs of the “classic academic stool” – remain equally strong and well positioned for future growth.