While Bixby can carry a tune and score points in recreational sports, his greatest gifts are a sharp, inquisitive mind and a passion for science. So, as it turns out, his loss to music and athletics is a win for humankind.

Today, Bixby is among the elite in the world of biomedical research, which the National Institutes of Health's Center for Scientific Review recently recognized by naming him chair of its Neurodifferentiation, Plasticity, and Regeneration Study Section for the next two years, a position that shines an ever-brighter spotlight on the caliber of scientists at the Miller School and The Miami Project.

Concentrating on finding novel cures for spinal cord injury, Bixby has co-authored numerous books and journal articles on different aspects of neuroscience and is highly regarded for his work in high-content screening and functional genomics of the nervous system. He and his wife, Rebecca Adkins, Ph.D., a professor of microbiology and immunology, joined UM 22 years ago. Their son Julian studies history at Wake Forest University.

"Looking back, I wouldn't change anything," says Bixby, who completed his undergraduate studies at Cornell University, graduate work at California Institute of Technology, and postdoctoral fellowships at the University of California, San Diego, and the University of California at San Francisco. "What I do now is what I was meant to do, and even after so many years, every day is both fulfilling and a new challenge."

Although his plate at the Miller School is already full, Bixby welcomes his new extracurricular NIH duties, which will require him to review scores of applications aimed at exploring the "fundamental cellular and molecular mechanisms, including changes in gene expression and regulation, underlying normal development and aging, as well as recovery from injury, disease, and pathological insults."

"A typical study section member will read and review about eight or 10 grants of about 60 or 70 that will be considered by the panel, and if the chair is doing the best job he or she can, he or she would have knowledge of all 60 or 70 of them," says Bixby, who, as a beneficiary of NIH funding, knows the immense responsibility that study section chairs have in helping to advance their fields. "It's a lot of work, but in a time when there is more competition for less grant funding, it is important for me to do the best job I can."

There's no doubt he's up to the task. As Richard Bookman, Ph.D., executive dean for research and research training, wrote in a congratulatory note: "This, despite all the work, is really an honor and a testament to your quality and well-deserved reputation as a first-class scientist."

Since 2003, Bixby has been collaborating with renowned researcher, Vance Lemmon, Ph.D., professor of neurological surgery and the Walter G. Ross Distinguished Chair in Developmental Neurosurgery. The prolific Lemmon/Bixby lab focuses on identifying genes and signaling networks that promote or prevent axon regeneration following disease or injury.

Every step of their research is a step toward making spinal cord-injured patients whole again. The process is slow, but their partnerships and teamwork with colleagues, doctoral and postdoctoral students have resulted in significant accomplishments. Their collaboration with Jeffrey Goldberg, M.D., Ph.D., assistant professor of ophthalmology at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, and members of his lab, helped identify Kruppel-like factor-4 (KLF4) as a transcriptional repressor of axon growth. Published in the prestigious journal Science last year, the research team's initial studies were expanded to look at the entire KLF4 family in regenerating not only the optic nerve, but also neurons in the brain.

But as noteworthy as that research is, Bixby is most proud of the contributions made to it by Darcie L. Moore, Ph.D., and Murray Blackmore, Ph.D., who as, respectively, a doctoral student with Dr. Goldberg and postdoctoral fellow in the Lemmon/Bixby lab, made some of the key KLF discoveries. In his dual role as associate dean for graduate studies and director of the Graduate Program in Biomedical Sciences, Bixby helps recruit such talent to UM.

"After you've done research for a long time, you find it rewarding, possibly more rewarding, to mentor other people, to see them acquire scientific abilities and scientific successes," Bixby notes. "Whether I publish one more paper doesn't really matter. But if I have students or postdocs who publish really great papers, that's very satisfying."