Michigan State University pharmacology and toxicology professor Gregory Fink has received the Irvine Page & Alva Bradley Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Heart Association, or AHA.
The award was recently presented in San Francisco during the joint scientific meetings of the AHA Council on Hypertension, the AHA Council on Kidney in Cardiovascular Disease and the American Society of Hypertension.
The award, sponsored by the Council on Hypertension, recognizes individuals who have excelled in the field of hypertension and served as role models through service, research and teaching.
Fink’s research focuses on the causes of cardiovascular disease, especially systemic hypertension. He is particularly interested in how sympathetic nerves affect short-term and long-term regulation of the cardiovascular system.
“Research is really the perfect career for me,” he said. “I’ve always been interested in problem solving, intellectual challenges and puzzles.”
Since 1990, he has been awarded close to $12 million in research funding and has published over 150 articles and abstracts.
Fink, who serves on the editorial boards of a number of peer review journals, including the American Journal of Physiology, Hypertension and Clinical Research, came to the MSU Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology in 1977 and became a full-time professor in 1987.
“I’ve taught in all areas of pharmacology at one time or another,” he said. “But hypertension and the cardiovascular system are really my first loves. I find teaching to be a great pleasure, and I've taught those subjects since I first arrived here.”
“The students would probably say that I could talk about it forever,” he added.
Fink has served on the executive committee and as treasurer for the Inter-American Society of Hypertension, as chairman of the National Institutes of Health, or NIH , Experimental Cardiovascular Sciences Study Section and he just recently finished a two-year term as chair of the American Heart Association Council on Hypertension.