Dr. Frank Booth is professor at the University of Missouri College of Veterinary Medicine and has published more than 120 peer-reviewed manuscripts, 70 invited reviews and a textbook that promotes exercise as good medicine. Recently, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) recently named Dr. Booth as the recipient of its prestigious Honor Award for 2011, the highest honor the College bestows. The award is granted to one individual each year with a distinguished career of outstanding scientific and scholarly contributions to sports medicine and the exercise sciences. Previously, Dr. Booth has been awarded the National Institutes of Health Merit Award, an ACSM Citation Award, an Honor Award from the International Conference on the Biochemistry of Exercise and the American Physiological Society’ Environmental and Exercise Section Honor Award.
Dr. Booth’s commitment to spotlighting the problems caused by a sedentary lifestyle also led Booth to establish a research organization, Researchers Against Inactivity-related Diseases (RID). To drive home its message, RID’s Web site features a death counter on its homepage that keeps a running tally of the number of deaths in the United States attributable to Sedentary Death Syndrome (SeDES). Dr. Booth also battles SeDES by setting an example through his own lifestyle. He not only runs to and from work, he also limits his vehicle usage to 50 miles per week by running all of his errands on campus and downtown. His motto is, “Go green and get healthy by non-motorized transportation.”