Arthur Knight Asbury, MD Professorship in Neurology

Arthur K. Asbury, MD and Carolyn H. Asbury, ScMPH, PhD, his wife of 42 years, established this professorship in 2019. It is to be held by the Chair of the Department of Neurology. The Asburys both dedicated their careers to advancing research, care and policy in the neurosciences. They created the professorship to extend their tradition of excellence and leadership to future generations.  

Dr. Arthur Asbury (1928–2022) was a pioneer of clinical and experimental peripheral nerve research. He was the Van Meter Professor of Neurology Emeritus at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. During his career, he held leadership positions at Penn, including Neurology Department Chair as well as Interim Dean and Executive Vice President of the University of Pennsylvania Medical System.  

During his more than 60-year career, Dr. Arthur Asbury became internationally recognized for his expertise on Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS), diabetic neuropathy and other peripheral nerve disorders. He was a past President of the American Neurological Association, the Association of University Professors of Neurology, the Philadelphia Neurological Society and the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. He was also Vice President of the World Federation of Neurology and received its Lifetime Achievement Award for his work in neuromuscular disease. Dr. Asbury was elected to the National Academy of Medicine and the Royal College of Physicians. He received numerous teaching awards, and in 2004 the Medical School established the annual Outstanding Faculty Mentoring award in his name. He was also honored with the I.S. Ravdin Master Clinician Award.  

Arthur Knight Asbury was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, on November 22, 1928, to two physicians, and his brother became an ophthalmic surgeon; all three were on the faculty at the University of Cincinnati. As a boy, Dr. Asbury spent summers working at Forest Retreat, the family’s historic thoroughbred breeding farm, which included a log cabin built by Daniel Boone in 1792. He graduated from Phillips Academy Andover and then from the University of Kentucky in 1951. Next, he served two years of active duty in the U.S. Army Reserve during the Korean War. Upon discharge, he attended the University of Cincinnati School of Medicine and graduated first in his class in 1958. He completed an internship, residency, and clinical research fellowships at Massachusetts General Hospital and served on the faculty of UC San Francisco as Vice Chair of Neurology. He came to Penn as the Chair of Neurology in 1974. 

Dr. Carolyn Asbury has led foundation grant programs in health and neuroscience, while her own research undertaken through the Leonard Davis Institute helped to inform design of the 1983 Orphan Drug Law and federal medical drug policies.  

Following her post-doctoral work at the UC San Francisco Institute for Health Policy Studies, Dr. Carolyn Asbury became a senior officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, developing grant programs on dementia and respite services, independent living for people with disabilities, and critical illness prognoses, and care and decision-making (the SUPPORT program). She then served as Director of the Pew Charitable Trusts Health and Human Services Program, and thereafter as Senior Consultant at the Dana Foundation, focused on neuroscience grants, where she served until 2022.  

Dr. Carolyn Asbury’s medical drug policy research was undertaken apart from her foundation work. Her studies focused on market and regulatory factors limiting development and market availability of drugs for rare diseases, pediatric therapies, vaccines, substance addiction and diseases in developing nations. She consulted pro bono with the U.S. Congress on design of the Orphan Drug Act to provide market incentives and regulatory provisions for therapies for rare diseases. The law’s market exclusivity provisions also have been credited with facilitating fiscal viability for newly developing biotechnology efforts.  

She trained at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health and the University of Pennsylvania. She is the author of numerous journal articles and book chapters on orphan drugs and the book Orphan Drugs: Medical vs Market Value. She was a member of the National Academy of Medicine’s Committee on Accelerating Progress on Rare Disease Research and Product Development. 

Dr. Carolyn Asbury served on the Boards of the U.S. Pharmacopeia, National Organization for Rare Disorders, Treatment Research Institute, and College of Physicians of Philadelphia. She has advised pharmaceutical firms on grant programs to increase academic training in pharmaceutical policy research, and international medical drug donation and distribution efforts. 

Current Chairholder
Frances E. Jensen, MD

Frances E. Jensen, MD, is the inaugural holder of the Arthur Knight Asbury, MD Professorship in Neurology. She serves as Professor and Chairman of Neurology at the Perelman School of Medicine and Co-Director of the Penn Translational Neuroscience Center. She was formerly Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School and Director of Translational Neuroscience and Senior Neurologist at Boston Children’s Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. After receiving her BA from Smith College and her MD from Cornell Medical College, she obtained her neurology residency training at the Harvard Longwood Neurology Residency Program.  

Dr. Jensen’s research focuses on mechanisms of epilepsy and stroke, and the mechanistic interaction of epilepsy with other disorders such as autism and dementia, with specific emphasis on elucidating new therapies for clinical trial development. Dr. Jensen received the 2007 Director’s Pioneer Award from the NIH to explore the interaction between epileptogenesis and cognitive dysfunction. She was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2015. Dr. Jensen has authored over 150 manuscripts on subjects related to her research and has been continuously funded by the NIH since 1987. She received an NIH-NINDS (National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke) Javits Award in 2020.  

Dr. Jensen has trained numerous clinical and basic research fellows who now hold independent faculty positions nationall