In December, President George W. Bush bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award, on Joshua Lederberg, PhD, and nine other distinguished Americans. Recipient of the 1958 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for his research in genetic structure and function in microorganisms, Lederberg was a member of the National Library of Medicine Board of Regents, from 1998 to 2002, and was the first chair of the PubMed Central National Advisory Committee.

A strong supporter of the NLM, Lederberg’s papers are included in the NLM’s Profiles in Science. He is also featured in the Dialogues in Science interactive display at the NLM Visitor Center.