Germany's highest civilian award, the Bundesverdienstkreuz (Officer of the Cross of the Order of Merit), has been conferred on Klaus W. Beyenbach, Cornell professor of physiology.
The award, by German President Roman Herzog, was presented to Beyenbach by Jürgen Chrobog, Germany's ambassador to the United States in Oct. 29 ceremonies at the German Embassy in Washington, D.C. Beyenbach was cited for his work on behalf of the Alexander von Humboldt Association of America.
An offshoot of Germany's Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the American association was formed in 1995 to promote scholarly, professional, educational and scientific collaboration between the German and American academic and research communities. One of three founders of the Alexander von Humboldt Association of America, Beyenbach served as the organization's first vice president and second president.
All members of the American association are Humboldtians, as former participants in Humboldt Foundation programs are known. Since 1953 the Humboldt Foundation has sponsored study in Germany by more than 19,000 scholars from some 125 countries in highly competitive programs, such as the Humboldt Fellowships and the Humboldt Research Awards. There are some 4,500 Humboldtians in the United States, where 22 Nobel laureates have been Humboldt awardees. At Cornell, 70 Humboldtians are members of the faculty and research staff of the university.
Beyenbach, whose research on kidney function and ion transport across cell membranes in the kidney is supported by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation, joined the Cornell faculty in 1978 and was named a professor of physiology in 1989. He earned a Ph.D. in zoophysiology (1974) from Washington State University and served as a fellow of the National Kidney Foundation (1974-76) at the University of Arizona College of Medicine.
Beyenbach received a Humboldt Research Award in 1992 and was a visiting scientist at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Physiology in Dortmund, Germany, from 1991 to 1992.
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