Endowed chair for asthma research established at UA

May 24, 2006

By hammersmith

A gift totaling nearly $1 million has been donated to the University of Arizona Foundation to create the Henry E. Dahlberg Chair in Asthma Research.

The endowment, which was given to the Arizona Respiratory Center, a center of excellence at UA’s College of Medicine, will be used to recruit a top researcher in adult asthma. The money previously resided with the Southern Arizona Asthma Foundation.

Fernando Martinez, director of the Arizona Respiratory Center, said the center is one of the top five interdisciplinary asthma research institutions in the country in terms of the funds it receives from the federal government.

“This new funding will allow us to add an investigator with very special skills to complement our group by studying what is happening in the lungs of adults with asthma,” he said.

According to Arizona’s Bioscience Roadmap, asthma is a niche area the state can build on to leapfrog ahead in the international bioscience race.

Lowell Rothschild, president of the Asthma Foundation, said the Arizona Respiratory Center is uniquely positioned to carry forward the vision of the Asthma Foundation and Dahlberg.

Henry Dahlberg was a businessman and entrepreneur who joined the Asthma Foundation Board in 1958. He was a strong supporter of the organization’s mission until his death in 2004.

“It was Henry’s vision that the foundation and the community owed a responsibility to the many persons suffering this disabling disease,” Rothschild told UA News. “The creation of a research chair at the university will ensure the continuance of his and the foundation’s caring concerns.”


For more information:

Endowed chair at UA to foster asthma research,” UA News, 05/11/2006