- Email: [email protected]
Michael Field, MD (1933–2014)
IN MEMORIAM Michael Field, MD (1933–2014)
I
t is with great sadness that we note the passing of a gastroenterologist, academician, and a dearly beloved mentor, Dr Michael Field (“Mike” to all of us) on August 23, 2014. Mike succumbed to an acute illness at the Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor, Maine, near his summer home, at age 81. Mike was a brilliant researcher, physician scientist, and mentor. His achievements are even more remarkable since he battled a series of devastating illnesses since he was 28years-old. The grace and success with which he overcame his personal health travails were an example of how to view these as minor bumps in the road and move on with the task at hand—in his case, research, writing, mentoring, and service. Dr Michael Field was born in London, England, on July 20, 1933 to Hans Hirschfeld, a businessman, and Dr Miriam Field, née Lewinson, a physician. After moving to Hamburg, Germany, the family had to leave abruptly, immigrating to America before the gathering storm that engulfed Germany and Europe. We understand that this past year, Mike reclaimed his German citizenship. When Mike was in high school in Pueblo, CO, he was a star member of the debate team—a skill that stayed with him. Having lost his father at 15, Mike and his mother moved to Chicago where he studied
Michael Field, MD
English Literature at the University of Chicago, graduating with honors in 1953. His love for the language was evident in the meticulous way he massaged his writings (and ours) to get the concept just right. Mike’s entry into Medicine was circuitous; he was told that his first passion, a study of African American literature and its social setting, had no future. He was clearly ahead of the time in 1953. Mike gradually switched interests to medicine and obtained his MD degree from Boston University Medical School in 1959; he completed his residency training in Internal Medicine at the Cleveland Metropolitan General Hospital. He fulfilled his military service as a Clinical Associate at the National Cancer Institute. Mike’s research career launched in full force first as a biophysical laboratory research fellow and then as a gastroenterology fellow at Harvard Medical School. He joined the faculty at Harvard and became an Associate Professor of Medicine at the Beth Israel Hospital. In 1977, Mike was lured back to his alma mater, the University of Chicago, as a Professor. He made the last of his career moves when he became Chief of Gastroenterology and Professor of Medicine and Physiology at Columbia University, in 1984. During his 17 years as Chief of Gastroenterology at Columbia, Mike was instrumental in the recruitment and early career development of several faculty members who went on to become internationally recognized physician-scientists or outstanding clinicians. Mike was a member of the AGA, GRG, and participant at DDW until his retirement. Mike’s research work in the 1960’s and 1970’s led to a paradigm shift in our concepts of intestinal function and diarrhea by providing insight into the cellular mechanisms of intestinal ion transport. He adapted the Ussing chamber to measure active ion transport across intestinal epithelia stripped of their muscle layer; a seemingly simple but key contribution. These studies established that cholera toxin increases cellular cyclic AMP and stimulates chloride secretion, but does not affect glucose-sodium coupled transport. This
insight provided the rationale for oral rehydration therapy for cholera and other diarrheal diseases. Oral rehydration therapy has, undoubtedly, been one of the major advances in global health in the 20th century. Over the next several decades, his studies provided an understanding of how the intestinal epithelium regulates water and electrolyte transport in response to an intricate web of extracellular and intracellular messengers. Seminal findings include delineating the role of intracellular nucleotides and calcium in mediating ion transport and the cellular and electrophysiological basis of active chloride secretion. His studies provided important insights into the role(s) of inflammatory mediators such as prostanoids, leukotrienes and bradykinin in diarrhea. The recognition that an alternate pathway of activating chloride secretion is through cyclic GMP provided the pathophysiologic basis for traveler’s diarrhea. He introduced one of the overarching “big picture” concepts of intestinal transport with the crypt villus paradigm of intestinal secretion and absorption: the idea that these regions are largely functionally distinct and exhibit shifts in phenotype as cells mature along the crypt villus axis. An essential part of Mike the scientist was his long-standing relationship with the Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory (MDIBL) in Bar Harbor, ME. Introduced to MDIBL by Dr Frank Epstein, while on vacation in 1973–1974, Mike joined that haven for epithelial transport biologists as a summer scientist in 1975; he contributed much to understanding the regulation of the sodium-potassium2chloride cotransporter and potassium channels in the flounder intestine. MDIBL cemented Mike’s infatuation with Maine and for the past nearly 40 years he has made it his summer home. Mike received many awards for his contributions including the King Faisal International Prize in Medicine, the Distinguished Achievement Award and the Distinguished Mentor Award of the AGA, and the Life Time Achievement Award from Janssen Pharmaceuticals. Mike was a superlative mentor. He instilled in all his trainees his passion Gastroenterology 2014;147:1191–1192
IN MEMORIAM for perfection, his zeal for an open quest for knowledge, new ideas and innovations, the importance of critical thinking, the central value of being truthful and rigorous in science, and the skill of putting one’s thoughts into a cohesive story. His exacting work ethic was contagious. He had the uncanny ability to parse through problems beyond his area of expertise and ask the critical question. At the same time, he made all of this a fun experience for us and most importantly, he always had time to listen to our ideas (his door was always open), help us prioritize our experiments, and view them in the context of their broadbased physiological and clinical relevance. Mike not only encouraged us to think out of the scientific box, he let us push the limits on the “norms” of academic life. While at Chicago, Mike opted to promote a fine addendum to drab notices in the hallway by using a white board as a canvas for creative thinking, but also for Stephanie Orellana to exhibit her amazing talent as a cartoonist parodying life in the laboratory. The “white board” moved with Mike to New York but without the creative cartoons. Mike was a holistic mentor — he not only cared about our scientific progress, he cared about us as individuals, our families, and our wellbeing. He was non- judgmental, so it was easy to discuss our trials and tribulations with him. Mike and his wife Linda were the consummate hosts and opened their home to us. Mike was way ahead of his time in understanding the importance of worklife balances. The finest example of this is when Mike vacated his office,
1192
becoming a brief-case totting nomad, looking for a vacant desk so that his postdoctoral fellow could bring her 5week-old nursing infant into a hazardfree space. Thirty-four years later, this story still elicits amazement in scientific circles. Mike brushed it off saying, “It was the only right thing to do.” One of us (after having spent 2 intense and exciting years working long hours, mostly in a windowless basement laboratory, generating data, discussing results, planning countless new experiments, and publishing papers with Mike) was preparing to return to Italy. At a farewell party for him and his wife (who worked with us as a laboratory manager), Mike, raising a toast, said in a contrite tone, “Look, I am sorry that you have to leave— but in frankness, I can easily replace you with plenty of other young investigators. It’s your wife’s leaving that will really affect us all!” This was Mike, always light, witty, and wonderfully absent-minded but immensely sharp. We and the entire gastroenterology community have lost an irreplaceable colleague and the world is now a little bit less bright. Mike was devoted to his family and often his circle of friends and trainees were part of his extended family. He is survived by his loving wife of 49 years, Dr Linda Seidel; their 3 sons and their wives; and 6 grandchildren: John Field and Kristen Bearse, parents of Helen and Thomas Field; Ezra and Marlene Field, parents of Gabriella, Abigail and Lillian Field; Benjamin and Viktoriya Torchinsky-Field, parents of Isaac Torchinsky-Field. Mike was a lifelong learner and continued to be actively engaged in scholarship after his retirement in 2001. In the past few years he was
steeped in learning Italian. At the time of his death Mike was putting the finishing touches on his memoir as a scientist and patient. We are grateful that his wife, Linda, is planning to complete the project. Our respect and admiration for Mike has not waivered over the decades, although our career paths diverged. It is no small wonder that many of Mike’s trainees have become successful physician-scientists, academic clinicians and research investigators. He has been the model of a mentor that we have all tried to emulate. Mike’s mentoring extended beyond his trainees, to many junior faculty and peers. His far-reaching imprint has created an international Mike Field diaspora of investigators. We will miss this exemplar role model, teacher, advisor and friend, who embodied the word mentor to the fullest. EUGENE B. CHANG STEFANO GUANDALINI University of Chicago Chicago, Illinois MRINALINI C. RAO University of Illinois at Chicago Chicago, Illinois JOSEPH H. SELLIN Baylor College of Medicine Houston, Texas CAROL E. SEMRAD University of Chicago Chicago, Illinois HOWARD WORMAN Columbia University New York , New York
http://dx.doi.org/10.1053/j.gastro.2014.10.026
I
t is with great sadness that we note the passing of a gastroenterologist, academician, and a dearly beloved mentor, Dr Michael Field (“Mike” to all of us) on August 23, 2014. Mike succumbed to an acute illness at the Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor, Maine, near his summer home, at age 81. Mike was a brilliant researcher, physician scientist, and mentor. His achievements are even more remarkable since he battled a series of devastating illnesses since he was 28years-old. The grace and success with which he overcame his personal health travails were an example of how to view these as minor bumps in the road and move on with the task at hand—in his case, research, writing, mentoring, and service. Dr Michael Field was born in London, England, on July 20, 1933 to Hans Hirschfeld, a businessman, and Dr Miriam Field, née Lewinson, a physician. After moving to Hamburg, Germany, the family had to leave abruptly, immigrating to America before the gathering storm that engulfed Germany and Europe. We understand that this past year, Mike reclaimed his German citizenship. When Mike was in high school in Pueblo, CO, he was a star member of the debate team—a skill that stayed with him. Having lost his father at 15, Mike and his mother moved to Chicago where he studied
Michael Field, MD
English Literature at the University of Chicago, graduating with honors in 1953. His love for the language was evident in the meticulous way he massaged his writings (and ours) to get the concept just right. Mike’s entry into Medicine was circuitous; he was told that his first passion, a study of African American literature and its social setting, had no future. He was clearly ahead of the time in 1953. Mike gradually switched interests to medicine and obtained his MD degree from Boston University Medical School in 1959; he completed his residency training in Internal Medicine at the Cleveland Metropolitan General Hospital. He fulfilled his military service as a Clinical Associate at the National Cancer Institute. Mike’s research career launched in full force first as a biophysical laboratory research fellow and then as a gastroenterology fellow at Harvard Medical School. He joined the faculty at Harvard and became an Associate Professor of Medicine at the Beth Israel Hospital. In 1977, Mike was lured back to his alma mater, the University of Chicago, as a Professor. He made the last of his career moves when he became Chief of Gastroenterology and Professor of Medicine and Physiology at Columbia University, in 1984. During his 17 years as Chief of Gastroenterology at Columbia, Mike was instrumental in the recruitment and early career development of several faculty members who went on to become internationally recognized physician-scientists or outstanding clinicians. Mike was a member of the AGA, GRG, and participant at DDW until his retirement. Mike’s research work in the 1960’s and 1970’s led to a paradigm shift in our concepts of intestinal function and diarrhea by providing insight into the cellular mechanisms of intestinal ion transport. He adapted the Ussing chamber to measure active ion transport across intestinal epithelia stripped of their muscle layer; a seemingly simple but key contribution. These studies established that cholera toxin increases cellular cyclic AMP and stimulates chloride secretion, but does not affect glucose-sodium coupled transport. This
insight provided the rationale for oral rehydration therapy for cholera and other diarrheal diseases. Oral rehydration therapy has, undoubtedly, been one of the major advances in global health in the 20th century. Over the next several decades, his studies provided an understanding of how the intestinal epithelium regulates water and electrolyte transport in response to an intricate web of extracellular and intracellular messengers. Seminal findings include delineating the role of intracellular nucleotides and calcium in mediating ion transport and the cellular and electrophysiological basis of active chloride secretion. His studies provided important insights into the role(s) of inflammatory mediators such as prostanoids, leukotrienes and bradykinin in diarrhea. The recognition that an alternate pathway of activating chloride secretion is through cyclic GMP provided the pathophysiologic basis for traveler’s diarrhea. He introduced one of the overarching “big picture” concepts of intestinal transport with the crypt villus paradigm of intestinal secretion and absorption: the idea that these regions are largely functionally distinct and exhibit shifts in phenotype as cells mature along the crypt villus axis. An essential part of Mike the scientist was his long-standing relationship with the Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory (MDIBL) in Bar Harbor, ME. Introduced to MDIBL by Dr Frank Epstein, while on vacation in 1973–1974, Mike joined that haven for epithelial transport biologists as a summer scientist in 1975; he contributed much to understanding the regulation of the sodium-potassium2chloride cotransporter and potassium channels in the flounder intestine. MDIBL cemented Mike’s infatuation with Maine and for the past nearly 40 years he has made it his summer home. Mike received many awards for his contributions including the King Faisal International Prize in Medicine, the Distinguished Achievement Award and the Distinguished Mentor Award of the AGA, and the Life Time Achievement Award from Janssen Pharmaceuticals. Mike was a superlative mentor. He instilled in all his trainees his passion Gastroenterology 2014;147:1191–1192
IN MEMORIAM for perfection, his zeal for an open quest for knowledge, new ideas and innovations, the importance of critical thinking, the central value of being truthful and rigorous in science, and the skill of putting one’s thoughts into a cohesive story. His exacting work ethic was contagious. He had the uncanny ability to parse through problems beyond his area of expertise and ask the critical question. At the same time, he made all of this a fun experience for us and most importantly, he always had time to listen to our ideas (his door was always open), help us prioritize our experiments, and view them in the context of their broadbased physiological and clinical relevance. Mike not only encouraged us to think out of the scientific box, he let us push the limits on the “norms” of academic life. While at Chicago, Mike opted to promote a fine addendum to drab notices in the hallway by using a white board as a canvas for creative thinking, but also for Stephanie Orellana to exhibit her amazing talent as a cartoonist parodying life in the laboratory. The “white board” moved with Mike to New York but without the creative cartoons. Mike was a holistic mentor — he not only cared about our scientific progress, he cared about us as individuals, our families, and our wellbeing. He was non- judgmental, so it was easy to discuss our trials and tribulations with him. Mike and his wife Linda were the consummate hosts and opened their home to us. Mike was way ahead of his time in understanding the importance of worklife balances. The finest example of this is when Mike vacated his office,
1192
becoming a brief-case totting nomad, looking for a vacant desk so that his postdoctoral fellow could bring her 5week-old nursing infant into a hazardfree space. Thirty-four years later, this story still elicits amazement in scientific circles. Mike brushed it off saying, “It was the only right thing to do.” One of us (after having spent 2 intense and exciting years working long hours, mostly in a windowless basement laboratory, generating data, discussing results, planning countless new experiments, and publishing papers with Mike) was preparing to return to Italy. At a farewell party for him and his wife (who worked with us as a laboratory manager), Mike, raising a toast, said in a contrite tone, “Look, I am sorry that you have to leave— but in frankness, I can easily replace you with plenty of other young investigators. It’s your wife’s leaving that will really affect us all!” This was Mike, always light, witty, and wonderfully absent-minded but immensely sharp. We and the entire gastroenterology community have lost an irreplaceable colleague and the world is now a little bit less bright. Mike was devoted to his family and often his circle of friends and trainees were part of his extended family. He is survived by his loving wife of 49 years, Dr Linda Seidel; their 3 sons and their wives; and 6 grandchildren: John Field and Kristen Bearse, parents of Helen and Thomas Field; Ezra and Marlene Field, parents of Gabriella, Abigail and Lillian Field; Benjamin and Viktoriya Torchinsky-Field, parents of Isaac Torchinsky-Field. Mike was a lifelong learner and continued to be actively engaged in scholarship after his retirement in 2001. In the past few years he was
steeped in learning Italian. At the time of his death Mike was putting the finishing touches on his memoir as a scientist and patient. We are grateful that his wife, Linda, is planning to complete the project. Our respect and admiration for Mike has not waivered over the decades, although our career paths diverged. It is no small wonder that many of Mike’s trainees have become successful physician-scientists, academic clinicians and research investigators. He has been the model of a mentor that we have all tried to emulate. Mike’s mentoring extended beyond his trainees, to many junior faculty and peers. His far-reaching imprint has created an international Mike Field diaspora of investigators. We will miss this exemplar role model, teacher, advisor and friend, who embodied the word mentor to the fullest. EUGENE B. CHANG STEFANO GUANDALINI University of Chicago Chicago, Illinois MRINALINI C. RAO University of Illinois at Chicago Chicago, Illinois JOSEPH H. SELLIN Baylor College of Medicine Houston, Texas CAROL E. SEMRAD University of Chicago Chicago, Illinois HOWARD WORMAN Columbia University New York , New York
http://dx.doi.org/10.1053/j.gastro.2014.10.026