FASEB Honors Gail Martin

The Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology has announced that Gail Martin will receive the 2011 Excellence in Science Award in honor of her work in embryonic stem cell research. Namely, her FGF-signaling research has elucidated human disease mechanisms, and she and her "colleagues were the first to demonstrate that female pluripotent stem cells contain two active X-chromosomes and can undergo X-inactivation in vitro when they form embryoid bodies, and she went on to characterize some of the epigenetic events leading to X-inactivation," according to a FASEB release. The award, sponsored by Eli Lilly and Company, will be presented along with an "unrestricted research grant" of $10,000, according to FASEB.