Bruns receives the 2024 Commonwealth Award from the One Health Microbiome Center

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Mary Ann Bruns, professor of soil microbiology and biogeochemistry in the College of Agricultural Sciences, received the Commonwealth Award from Penn State’s One Health Microbiome Center on May 30.

The Commonwealth Award is bestowed every two years by the center to recognize a member who has had a career-long view and positive impact on the microbiome community far beyond his or her research. This award recognizes unwavering, enduring and sustained service to the commonwealth in any area of the microbiome sciences.

Bruns, who will retire this summer, has had a beautiful and deeply impactful career in microbiological research and higher education, according to Seth Bordenstein, director of the One Health Microbiome Center. She is a deserving recipient of the award, he said, because of her attention to and heartfelt support for all ranks of scholars in the center, from students to faculty.

“This award honors those who bring out the best of us and exemplify our university’s motto and creed of ‘making life better’ — it is this principle that Mary Ann lives by,” Bordenstein said. “This honor was unanimously approved by the center’s executive committee in recognition of her tremendous caring, wide-ranging advice, thoughtful commitment to and influence on the microbiome sciences and scientists.”

Bruns said she is humbled by the recognition. “I was thrilled to be the second recipient of this award at the One Health Microbiome Symposium, and I appreciated being recognized for my work in getting the dual-title Ph.D. program in microbiome sciences established.”

The Commonwealth Award was established in 2022 and will be offered in 2026 to recognize the long-lasting legacy of its recipients.