We are thrilled to announce the newly established Natasha Josefowitz Pre- and Postdoctoral Fellowship intended to attract graduate students and early-career researchers of extraordinary promise pursuing research on aging.
Established by a generous gift by Dr. Natasha Josefowitz, the fellowship’s appointment comes with an annual stipend for research and travel.
Dr. Josefowitz epitomizes the term trailblazer – and has spent her life as an educator both within and outside of academia. She is a business consultant, keynote speaker, poet, syndicated columnist, and author of 21 books. Dr. Josefowitz taught the first course for women in management in the country at the University of New Hampshire and San Diego State University. For ten years she had her own weekly program on public radio and a monthly television segment. A longtime supporter of the UC San Diego Center for Healthy Aging and the Stein Institute, Dr. Josefowitz is a past President of the Stein Institute's Community Advisory Board and a recipient of our 2019 Champion for Healthy Aging Award. She was inducted into the San Diego County Women’s Hall of Fame in 2015, received the Living Legacy Award from the Women’s International Center, and was named as one of San Diego’s “Top Guns” by the San Diego Business Journal. The Washington Post says: “Natasha Josefowitz is helping her generation, and those that follow, find their way into a successful, meaningful and fun older age…her optimism about aging is inspiring.”
The first Josefowitz Fellow, Hazel Dilmore, a Ph.D. student, has taken a very rigorous course load in the Biomedical Sciences program at UC San Diego, all while conducting groundbreaking research on the microbiome. Dilmore uses computational tools to elucidate connections between the gut microbiome, mental illness, and aging. She is particularly interested in how microbially-derived metabolites may influence the progression of mental illness in older patients.
“I am honored and grateful to be named the Dr. Natasha Josefowitz Predoctoral Fellow at the Stein Institute. I am excited to explore associations between the gut microbiome and healthy aging during my fellowship with my incredible mentors at UC San Diego,” said Dilmore.
To celebrate the launch of this fellowship program, we are excited to share a poem by Dr. Josefowitz.
my right hand is being held
by someone who knows more than I
and I am learning
my left hand is being held
by someone who knows less than I
and I am teaching
and both my hands need thus be held
for me to be.
