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The NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellowship in the History of Medicine

The NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellowship in the History of Medicine provides individual awards of up to $10,000 to U.S. citizens and permanent residents to support research in the collection of the National Library of Medicine (NLM).

The NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellowship in the History of Medicine was established in 2016 through support from The DeBakey Medical Foundation.

Spanning eleven centuries, the NLM collection encompasses a variety of digital and physical formats and originates from nearly every part of the globe. The collection includes the Michael E. DeBakey papers—representing the diverse areas in which Dr. DeBakey made a lasting impact, such as surgery, medical education, and health care policy—along with the papers of many other luminaries in science and medicine.

Supported research may be conducted onsite at the NLM by studying the collection in the NLM Reading Room, or remotely using NLM digital resources, including not only its digitized and born-digital collections but also its datasets. Projects embracing methods and tools of the digital humanities are welcome. Applicants are expected to complete their work according to their proposal and within their fellowship year.

Support for research in collections that are intellectually related to those of the NLM will be considered, but the overall proposed research must be primarily rooted in the NLM collection.

For the 2026 cycle of the fellowship, we welcome applicants justifying support for their research using the NLM collection based on needs such as:

dedicated time to complete research and/or writing, including organizing, reviewing, and preparing collected research materials for a scholarly/interpretative publication.
securing research and/or technical assistance for data and/or database analyses.
analyzing and interrogating NLM’s digitized collections, web archive collections and/or historical datasets.
preparing an open-access scholarly/interpretative digital publication, including work associated with incorporating images, video, audio, and/or manipulatable element(s) intended to enhance access and understanding by readers.
payment of reproduction and/or permission fees for images of unique or rare materials essential for the applicant’s research.

We encourage applicants seeking support for digital and data-driven research to consult with the appropriate colleagues in their institution, or the CORE repository of Humanities Commons, to meet the terms of the NIH Public Access Policy for NIH supported work.

Requirements of the Fellowship

Fellows receiving an award for onsite research at the NLM are expected to make at least one visit within their fellowship year.

Within a year following completion of their research, all fellows are expected to author one guest article for NLM’s Circulating Now blog based on their research.

Additionally, NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellows are required to:

consult with NLM staff to improve the library’s existing finding aids and related resources by enhancing the Library’s knowledge of its collection and ability to provide informed access to it;
meet the terms of the NIH Public Access Policy for NIH supported work, and acknowledge the NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellowship in the History of Medicine in any resulting publications;
respond to requests for interviews and information, in cooperation with the NLM.

Selected fellows may be invited to present an annual NLM Michael E. DeBakey Lecture in the History of Medicine, as part of the NLM History Talks.

How to Apply

Submit all required materials to the Foundation for Advanced Education in the Sciences (FAES) via the online application portal by midnight ET, September 30, 2025. Selected fellows will be notified and awards will be announced in December.

Any U.S. citizen or permanent resident age eighteen or over, of any academic discipline and status, who has not previously received this Fellowship, is invited to apply. Fellowships will be awarded to individual applicants, not to institutions. Group applications will be considered but will be subject to a maximum award of $10,000 for the entire project regardless of the number of participants. Group applications should be submitted under the name of a single principal researcher.

Your application package must include the following:

CV including your preferred email address (not more than three pages)
Research Project Abstract, Methods, and Anticipated Research Outcomes, including brief mention of how you became aware of the NLM DeBakey Fellowship program, as well as anticipated publications and, if applicable, data preservation (not more than 1500 words)
Bibliography (not more than two pages, including the specific NLM collections you plan to study, onsite and/or digital, and selected (4-5) key secondary works which directly inform your research)
Proposed Research Budget (include all anticipated costs, use the S. General Services Administration (GSA) Per Diem Rates as a helpful guide for expenses, note that the awarded funding for selected fellows will be based on the expenses listed in the submitted research budget including those based on core needs)
Transcript (required for currently enrolled students only)
Two Letters of Support (at least one of which must be from someone familiar with the proposed project)

Explore NLM historical collections, web archives, and related datasets, and use our research tools.

For all other inquiries contact NLM Customer Support or call 1-888-346-3656 Monday through Friday 9:00 am-5:00 pm ET.

NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellows in the History of Medicine

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2025 Fellows

Abigail Agresta, PhD
Department of History
George Washington University
Research Project: The Rise of Quarantine in Late Medieval Spain

Claire D. Clark, PhD, MPH
Departments of Behavioral Science and History
University of Kentucky
Research Project: Addiction Treatment Research Before and After the Narcotic Addict Rehabilitation Act of 1966: The View from the US Public Health Service Hospital in Lexington, Kentucky

Noëlle Foster, PhD
Department of Psychiatry, Robert Wood Johnson School of Medicine
Rutgers University
Research Project: In the Middle of the Stream: Henry Leber Coit and the Formation of American Pediatrics

Andrew Lea, MD, DPhil
Brigham and Women's Hospital
Harvard Medical School
Research Project: Aid to Thought: A History of the Peripheral Brain in Medicine

Allison Weiderhold, MS
College of Medicine
Kansas City University
Research Project: The Success of Female Cardiac Surgeons—A Historic Review of Mentorship

Anna Winterbottom, PhD
Department of History
McGill University
Research Project: Oral, Visual, and Textual Cultures of Medicine: An Examination of Early Modern Texts in the Collection of the National Library of Medicine
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2024 Fellows

Ayman Yasin Atat, PhD
Academic Researcher, Department for History of Science and Pharmacy
Technische Universität Braunschweig, Germany
Research Project: European Medical Sources in the Manuscripts of Ibn Sallūm al-Ḥalabī

Paul D. Blanc, MD, MSPH
Professor of Medicine Emeritus, Division of Occupational, Environmental and Climate Medicine
University of California, San Francisco
Research Project: Dying to Make a Living—A Global History of the Way Work Sickens, Maims, and Kills

Esther Chung-Kim, PhD
Professor, Department of Religious Studies
Claremont McKenna College
Research Project: Democratization of Medicine—Access to Health Care in Early Modern Europe

Rebecca Irvine, MA
PhD Candidate
City University of New York
Research Project: Conceptualizing Disease and New Approaches to Public Health in Iraq, 1946–1958

Brittany Rhoades, PhD, APRN, CCNS, FCNS
Clinical Nurse Specialist, Michael E. DeBakey Department of Surgery
Baylor College of Medicine
Research Project: The Heart of Surgery—How the Humanities Influenced Legendary Surgeon Michael E. DeBakey

Bryan P. Stringer, MA
PhD Candidate
Boston University
Research Project: “Health Centers Come out of the Cellar”—The United States Public Health Service and the Design of Public Health Centers in Post War America
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2023 Fellows

Winston Black, PhD
Gatto Chair of Christian Studies
St. Francis Xavier University, Nova Scotia, Canada
Research Project: Medieval Medicine in Transition: The Manuscript Evidence from Twelfth Century England

Brice Bowrey
PhD Candidate, Department of History
University of Maryland-College Park
Research Project: Topic Modeling of Historical Biomedical Technology Research Literature

Jennifer Hutton
PhD Candidate, Department of History
University of Bristol, United Kingdom
Research Project: Infant Blindness, A Social History of Retrolental Fibroplasia

Marina Pérez de Arcos, DPhil, FRHistS
Head of Politics and History, Assistant Professor
Forward College—Europe/London School of Economics and Political Science
Research Project: Medicine and Diplomacy in and Beyond First World War Camps: Knowledge Transfers, International Humanitarian Law, and Internment
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2022 Fellows

Ogechukwu Williams, PhD
Assistant Professor, Department of History and Department of Medical Humanities
Creighton University
Research Project: Dying to Bring Life: A Social History of Maternal Deaths in Nigeria

S.J. Zanolini, LAc
PhD Candidate, History of Medicine
Johns Hopkins Medical School
Research Project: Everyday Medicine: Prescribed Diets in Early Modern China
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2021 Fellows

Jessica L. Adler, PhD
Associate Professor, Steven J. Green School of International & Public Affairs and Robert Stempel College of Public Health & Social Work
Florida International University
Research Project: Minimal Standards of Adequacy: A History of Health Care in U.S. Prisons

Scottie Hale Buehler, CPM, PhD
Visiting Research Affiliate, Institute for Historical Studies
University of Texas at Austin
Research Project: Being and Becoming a Midwife in the French Atlantic (1750–1820)

Kirsten Ostherr, PhD, MPH
Gladys Louise Fox Professor and Chair, Department of English and Director of the Program in Medical Humanities
Rice University
Research Project: The Visual History of Computational Health
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2020 Fellows

Christopher Crenner, MD, PhD
Department of the History and Philosophy of Medicine
University of Kansas Medical Center
Research Project: Ulcers: The Rise and Decline of a Surgical Disease

Marcos Cueto, PhD
Casa Oswaldo Cruz, Fundação Oswaldo Cruz
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Research Project: Global AIDS and Brazil

Daniel G. Cumming, MA
PhD Candidate in History
New York University
Research Project: Social Determinants of Health in Baltimore

Allison A. Hill-Edgar, MD, MFA
Artist and Independent Scholar
New York Academy of Art, and the Fenimore Art Museum, Cooperstown, NY
Research Project: Reframing Anatomical History Through the Female Body

Todd M. Olszewski, PhD
Department of Health Policy and Management
Providence College
Research Project: Mission and Mandate: Biomedical Politics and Science Administration at the National Institutes of Health

Christopher J. Phillips, PhD
Department of History
Carnegie Mellon University
Research Project: Number Doctors: Health, Statistics, and the Reformation of Medical Knowledge
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2019 Fellows

Sara Farhan, MA
PhD Candidate in History
York University
Research Project: Baghdad and Beirut in Baylor: Surgical Pedagogies and the Internationalization of Medical Education, 1945-1970
Read DeBakey in the Middle East on Circulating Now

Susan Y. Green, MPH
Michael E. DeBakey Department of Surgery
Baylor College of Medicine
Research Project: The Development of the DeBakey Classification of Aortic Dissection
Read The Development of the DeBakey Classification of Aortic Dissection on Circulating Now

Michael Kronenfeld, MLS, MBA, AHIP, FMLA
University Librarian, A.T. Still Memorial Library
A.T. Still University of the Health Sciences
and
Jennie Jacobs Kronenfeld, PhD
Professor Emerita, Arizona State University
Research Project: The History of Health Science Librarianship
Read Al Gore and the National Library of Medicine on Circulating Now

Kelly S. O’Donnell, PhD
College of Humanities and Sciences
Thomas Jefferson University
Research Project: How the Doctor’s Wife Transformed American Medicine
Read MD’s Wife: Subscriptions and Prescriptions About Medical Marriages Across the Twentieth Century on Circulating Now

Tom Quick, PhD
Centre for the History of Science, Technology & Medicine
University of Manchester
Research Project: Bacteriology and Wound Care during World War II
Read Airborne Infection Control in 20-Century Peace and War on Circulating Now

Matthew Stibbe, PhD
Humanities Research Centre
Sheffield Hallam University
Research Project: Civilian Internment during the First World War: Humanitarian Relief and Medical Interventions
Read ‘Barbed-wire disease’ during the First World War on Circulating Now
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2018 Fellows

Divyansh Agarwal, MS
MD/PhD Trainee, Perelman School of Medicine
University of Pennsylvania
Research Project: The DeBakey Method for Today's Aspiring Surgeon-Scientist
Read Letters Shed Light on Huey Long’s Murder Mystery on Circulating Now

Susan Crawford, PhD
Professor and Director Emeritus
Biomedical Communications Center
Research Project: Biomedical Communication: The Evolution of a Paradigm
Read From Discovery to Digital Science: The U.S. National Library of Medicine on Circulating Now

Alyssa F. Gabay
Undergraduate, Senior, Class of 2018, History Honors Program
University of Maryland, College Park
Research Project: Understanding Dr. DeBakey’s Development and Implementation of His Aneurysm Repair Methods and External Ventricular Assist Devices
Read Sign of the Times: How An Environment for Innovation Helped Transform Cardiovascular Surgery on Circulating Now

Sanders Marble, PhD
Senior Historian
U.S. Army Center of History and Heritage
Research Project: Uncovering Michael DeBakey’s War Years
Read Detailing Michael DeBakey’s War Years: Puzzle Pieces on Circulating Now
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2017 Fellows

Justin Barr, MD, PhD
General Surgery Resident
Duke University Medical Center
Research Project: Michael E. DeBakey and his Seminal Role in the Creation, Adoption, and Application of Arterial Repair
Read Michael DeBakey and the Education of American Surgeons on Circulating Now

Kurt Dasse, PhD
President & CEO, GeNO LLC
Research Project: Inside the Creative Mind of Dr. Michael E. DeBakey and His Everlasting Impact on Medical Technology
Read Inside the Creative Mind of Dr. Michael E. DeBakey on Circulating Now

Craig A. Miller, MD
Scholar-in-Residence, Medical Cultural Heritage Center
The Ohio State University
Research Project: A Comprehensive Biography of Michael E. DeBakey
Read A Time for All Things: Michael E. DeBakey—The Tulane Years on Circulating Now

Heidi Morefield, MSc
PhD Candidate in History, Department of the History of Medicine
The Johns Hopkins University
Research Project: Making Technology Appropriate: Health, Development, and Modernization in the Global Cold War
Read Tinkering with Profitability: DeBakey and the Affordable Blood Transfusion Instrument on Circulating Now

Andrew Simpson, PhD
Assistant Professor of History, Department of History
Duquesne University
Research Project: Making the Medical Metropolis: Health Care and the Post-Industrial Transformation of Pittsburgh and Houston
Read The Power of a Name: Michael DeBakey ad the Changing Business of American Medicine on Circulating Now
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Fellow Publications

Divyansh Agarwal

“Reciprocal Learning Between Military and Civilian Surgeons: Past and Future Paths for Medical Innovation,” with C.W. Schwab, C.F. Barker, and A.N. Naji, in Annals of Surgery, 2019. PMID: 31599807

Justin Barr

Of Life and Limb: Surgical Repair of the Arteries in War and Peace, 1880-1960, Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2019.

“The Role of the American Board of Surgery on the Development of Surgical Residencies in Post World War II America,” with T.N. Pappas, in The American Surgeon, 85 (3), 2019. PMID: 30947768.

“The Education of American Surgeons and the Rise of Surgical Residencies, 1930-1960,” in Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, 73 (3), 2018. PMID: 29408971.

Susan Green

“Thoracoabdominal Aortic Aneurysm Repair: From an Era of Revolution to an Era of Evolution,” with Huu, A.L. and Coselli, J.S., in Seminars in Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, 31(4), 2019. PMID: 31212015.

Michael Kronenfeld and Jennie Jacobs Kronenfeld

A History of Medical Libraries and Medical Librarianship From John Shaw Billings to the Digital Era, Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield, 2021.

Craig Miller

A Time for All Things: The Life of Michael E. DeBakey,Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019.

“Genesis of an Innovator: Michael E. DeBakey and the Development of the Sleeve-Valve Transfusion Syringe.” Journal of the Southern Association for the History of Medicine and Science 1(1) 2019.

Andrew Simpson

The Medical Metropolis: Health Care and Economic Transformation in Pittsburgh and Houston, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019.

Matthew Stibbe

“Out of Sight, Out of Mind: reflections from the Covid era on social knowledge and medical thinking in Adolf Lukas Vischer’s ‘barbed wire disease’," in Immigrants & Minorities, 2024

Civilian Internment during the First World War: A European and Global History, 1914-1920, London: Palgrave, 2019.
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NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellowship | Circulating Now
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Michael DeBakey standing in blue scrubs and a white lab coat with his hands on his hips.

Michael E. DeBakey, 1980

Courtesy Aaron Shikler

About Michael E. DeBakey

The NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellowship in the History of Medicine is made possible through a gift from The DeBakey Medical Foundation. Michael E. DeBakey (1908–2008) was a legendary American surgeon, educator, and medical statesman. During a career spanning 75 years, his work transformed cardiovascular surgery, raised medical education standards, and informed national health care policy. He performed some of the first heart transplants and pioneered dozens of operative procedures such as aneurysm repair, coronary bypass, and endarterectomy, which routinely save thousands of lives each year. His inventions included the roller pump (a key component of heart-lung machines), as well as artificial hearts and ventricular assist pumps. He was a driving force in building Houston's Baylor University College of Medicine into a premier medical center, where he trained several generations of top surgeons from all over the world. Michael DeBakey was instrumental in bringing NLM to the NIH campus and served for many years on NLM’s Board of Regents.

Learn more about Michael E. DeBakey from NLM’s Profiles in Science.

Last Reviewed: May 5, 2025