Anthony W. Norman

Anthony W. Norman received his A.B. from Oberlin College in 1959, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Biochemistry in 1961 and 1963, respectively, from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Following postdoctoral work in Paul D. Boyer’s group at UCLA, in 194 he joined the Department of Biochemistry at University of California, Riverside, as an Assistant Professor. From 1976 to 1981 he served as Chair of the department and currently holds a Presidential Chair and is a Distinguished Professor of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences. Dr. Norman has also been active for some 25 years in medical education on the UC-Riverside campus and at UCLA through participation in the UR/UCLA Program in Biomedical Sciences, of which he was Dean and Director from 1986 to 1991.

Dr. Norman's biomedical research career has focused on the mechanism of action of the vitamin D family of steroids. His chief contributions to these areas of cellular and molecular endocrinology have played a pivotal role in defining the boundaries of this research domain via discoveries that have opened new areas of investigation. The first of these was the discovery in 1968, and chemical characterization in 1971, of the hormonally active form of vitamin D, 1a,25(OH)2-vitamin D3. Subsequent achievements include the discovery and characterization of the nuclear receptor for 1a,25(OH)2D3, the clinical evaluation of 1a,25(OH)2D3 in renal osteodystrophy, articulation of the concept of the vitamin D endocrine system, the importance of 1a,25(OH)2D3 to insulin secretion and the discovery of a new rapid, nongenomic, signal transduction process for 1a,25(OH)2D3.

Dr. Norman has been the recipient of awards that include a Fulbright Fellowship, 1970; Public Health Service Career Development Award, 1970; Mead Johnson Award, American Institute of Nutrition, 1977; Ernst Oppenheimer Award, Endocrine Society, 1977; Visiting Lecturer Australian Society of Endocrinology, 1978; Visiting Faculty Member, Mayo Clinic, 1981; Prix Andre