2024 Christine M. Ladisch Faculty Leadership Award

Written By: Rebecca Hoffa, rhoffa@purdue.edu

Ulrike Dydak

Ulrike Dydak, professor of health sciences in the Purdue University School of Health Sciences, is the recipient of the 2024 Christine M. Ladisch Faculty Leadership Award.

Established in 2018, the award is presented annually to a woman faculty member in the College of Health and Human Sciences who is interested in developing her leadership skills. The award provides up to $5,000 to cover the cost of participation in courses, conferences, workshops, institutes or other leadership opportunities that promote the development of faculty leaders.

Dydak is a medical physicist and has years of experience leading the Life Science MRI Facility, from spearheading the effort to establish the facility to then directing it when it launched in 2016. She has led the facility to supporting an average of 20 research groups per year — a number that continues to increase. The facility has become much more than simply a shared research tool, cultivating symposia, developing and disseminating novel MRI methodology, promoting imaging research, training students and supporting a student organization.

To further advance her leadership in the MRI research landscape, Dydak plans to use the award to build the necessary knowledge and skills to develop and lead a new university center for MRI research at Purdue — an effort that will make Purdue more competitive for future grants.

Because of the lack of workshop opportunities available for managing medical imaging facilities like Purdue’s Life Science MRI Facility, Dydak plans to visit five or six successful MRI research centers to study their management and financial structure and bring her findings back to Purdue. These visits will help her advance her leadership skills in MRI facility management and grow Purdue’s MRI research support in creating a financially sustainable and thriving research center.

The award is funded by an endowment that honors Christine M. Ladisch in recognition of her outstanding leadership at Purdue University. From 2010-18, she served as the inaugural dean of the College of Health and Human Sciences. Prior to that, she served as head of the former Department of Consumer Sciences and Retailing, associate dean of the former College of Consumer and Family Sciences, and the university’s vice provost for academic affairs.

For more information, please contact Ulrike Dydak or Susie Swithers.

• Ulrike Dydak, professor, School of Health Sciences, udydak@purdue.edu.
• Susie Swithers, associate dean for faculty affairs, College of Health and Human Sciences, swithers@purdue.edu.

2023 recipient: Georgia Malandraki

2022 recipient: Sharon Christ

2021 recipients: Jiyun Kang and Christi Masters