Dr. Daniel Notterman, vice dean for research and graduate studies for Penn State College of Medicine and Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, is stepping down from his position to enter “semi-retirement” effective July 1. Notterman plans to return to teaching at Princeton University. He will also continue his research on gene-environment interactions in child development and the genetic basis of autism, both at Princeton and at Penn State College of Medicine.
Over the course of his nearly five years at Penn State Hershey, Notterman made a significant and lasting impact on the research mission. He was instrumental in founding the Institute for Personalized Medicine in 2012, one of the first institutes of its kind in the country. The institute focuses on developing genomic-based treatments and diagnostic pathways tailored to the genetic and metabolic make-up of individual patients and their specific disease.
During Notterman’s tenure, the College of Medicine and the University founded the Penn State Clinical Translational Science Institute, supported by a $27.3 million, five-year award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to help advance discoveries from the research lab to the patient care setting more quickly and effectively. In addition, Penn State Hershey’s overall NIH rank among research institutions improved from 71 to 57.
With an emphasis on finding new sources of funding to support biomedical research at Penn State Hershey, Notterman spear-headed an effort to increase the amount of industry-sponsored research at Penn State Hershey, which increased by 25 percent last year. He also made critical investments in core research infrastructure and the Office of Technology Development to encourage the development and commercialization of new products by entrepreneurial faculty members.
With a strong desire to support emerging research by junior faculty members in the College of Medicine, Notterman fostered the creation of two distinct award programs named in honor of founding chairs of comparative medicine and pharmacology, C. Max Lang and Elliot Vessell, along with two similar award programs named in honor of emeritus faculty William S. Pierce and Mary Judith Tevethia.
During his time overseeing graduate programs, Penn State Hershey added a doctorate program in biostatistics and a master’s in public health program (MPH). In collaboration with University Park, Harrisburg and Great Valley campuses, the MPH program prepares students for careers in public health promotion and disease prevention, health administration and policy, and public health research. His leadership was instrumental to the development and implementation of a unified program in biomedical sciences. The program has made Penn State Hershey’s graduate programs more attractive to students seeking flexible research training options and a wider choice of faculty advisers than traditional, department-based programs often offer.
Notterman also brought a renewed focus to recruiting and retaining under-represented minority students in graduate programs at Penn State Hershey, overseeing the launch of a program to help smooth the transition from undergraduate to graduate training.
He also worked to establish the Leadership Academy at Penn State Hershey, an interdisciplinary effort with the Penn State Smeal College of Business and Penn State Executive Programs, the College of Medicine and Penn State Hershey Medical Center. The program helps participants develop the skills required to excel in strategic leadership and management roles in academic health centers and health care organizations.
A national search for a new vice dean for research and graduate studies will begin in the coming weeks.