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Pettigrew Selected to Serve on NIH Grant Review Committee

Melinda M. Pettigrew, Ph.D.

A national biomedical and health research group has invited a School of Public Health faculty member to serve on its grant review committee.

Melinda M. Pettigrew, Ph.D., an associate professor in the division of Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases, will join the National Institutes of Health (NIH) as a member of the Infectious Diseases, Reproductive Health, Asthma and Pulmonary Conditions Study Section, Center for Scientific Review, effective July 1.

During the four–year term, Pettigrew’s responsibilities will include reviewing grant applications submitted to the NIH, making recommendations on applications to the NIH’s national advisory board and surveying the status of research in the fields that her study section covers. The NIH is a major source of funding for medical and health–related research projects. The Center for Scientific Review receives over 80,000 applications per year and standing study sections review 70 percent of these applications.

“These functions are of great value to medical and allied research in this country,” said Toni Scarpa, director of the NIH’s Center for Scientific Review.

Pettigrew was invited to join the study committee because of her “demonstrated competence and achievement” in her scientific discipline and because of the quality of her published research, Scarpa said.

Pettigrew, who joined the faculty of the School of Public Health in 2002, said she was honored by the invitation and looks forward to representing Yale. Her term expires in 2013. Pettigrew’s current research focuses on the molecular epidemiology of infectious diseases and their impact upon women and young children. She is currently working on projects that explore the complex interactions between members of the microbial flora in the nasopharynx of young children and in the reproductive tracts of women with repeat chlamydia infection.

“I am looking forward to working with this great group of people to ensure that the NIH can fund the most promising and cutting–edge research. The peer review process is currently undergoing significant changes and this is an exciting time to be a reviewer,” Pettigrew said of her appointment to the panel.

~ Story by Michael Greenwood