Candidate for Medical School Deanship Makes Harvard Appearance

Elizabeth G. Nabel, reportedly a leading candidate for the deanship of Harvard Medical School, made an under-the-radar appearance on Harvard’s campus Friday.

Nabel, director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, was seen near Mass. Hall late Friday afternoon as she made her way to a waiting Lincoln Town Car headed for Logan Airport.

She arrived in Cambridge on Thursday and was scheduled to spend Friday participating in what appeared to be a series of meetings related to her candidacy for one of Harvard’s most powerful posts.

Asked by reporters whether she had been offered the deanship, Nabel replied: “No comment.” She did not respond when asked why she was on campus.

Nabel, a resident of Bethesda, Md., and Reisman Professor of Medicine Jeffrey S. Flier are said to be on the top of the list of potential replacements for HMS dean Joseph B. Martin, The Boston Globe reported on Thursday.

Martin will step down on June 30.

Nabel, who trained at the Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital, would be the first woman to lead the Medical School in the institution’s 225-year history.

Flier currently serves as the chief academic officer at the Harvard-affiliated Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, where he conducts research focused on obesity and diabetes. A spokesman for Flier declined to comment on his candidacy on Thursday.

University spokesman John D. Longbrake said on Thursday that he could not comment on the ongoing dean search in accordance with University policy.

Earlier this year, a group of Harvard faculty, drawn mostly from the medical school, was formed to narrow down a list of hundreds candidates who were proposed for the post.

The committee has met with both Bok and President-elect Drew G. Faust to discuss candidates.

“It’s fair to say that whenever Harvard searches for a dean, a wide net is cast,” advisory committee member James H. Thrall said in an interview in April. “We have had at least 300 names recommended to the committee.”

After a decade-long tenure, Martin announced his plans to resign from the post effective this July.

“It would be terrific to have a new dean by then to promote continuity,” said Thrall, who is the Taveras Professor of Radiology, at the time. “Meeting such a deadline will be a challenge.”

The dean of Harvard Medical School oversees 11,000 faculty members at the school and 18 affliated institutions, which combined received over one billion dollars in federal funding for research last year.

Faust must also appoint leaders of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the Graduate School of Design before she takes office on July 1.

—Aditi Banga, Paras D. Bhayani, Claire M. Guehenno, Javier C. Hernandez, Jamison A. Hill, and Clifford M. Marks contributed to the reporting of this story.