Family and friends of Professor Gopi K Podila, who was among the three biology professors shot dead by a colleague at the University of Alabama's Huntsville campus, are still in shock.
Police charged Dr Amy Bishop, assistant biology professor, with capital murder.
Podila, chairman of the department of Biological Sciences and Professor of plant molecular biology and biotechnology, joined the university six years ago, a family friend, who was at the home of Podila told rediff.com on Saturday morning. The shooting occurred at 4 pm Friday evening.
He was in Michigan earlier, she said. His wife Vani is a researcher at CSD Research. The couple has two girls, 17 and 14.
Vani's sister lives in Canada. Family members are yet to arrive at the home. The body is still in police custody pending autopsy. "Nothing is finalised yet. We are waiting for the family members," the friend, who did not want her name to be published, said. Huntsville has a fairly large community of Indians, she said.
The University is closed Saturday. The campus has an Indian Students Organisation.
Harvard educated Professor Bishop, 40, is termed a 'star researcher'. She came to know that she was denied a tenure at the faculty, which might have provoked her to shoot at the meeting of the biology faculty, reports said.
Bishop and her husband, Jim Anderson, are credited with inventing a mobile cell incubation system touted a replacement. UAH President David Williams predicted in November 2008 that the couple's InQ device would 'change the way biological and medical research is conducted,' according to some media reports.
Bishop has been a tenure track assistant biology professor at UAH since 2003. She teaches anatomy and physiology, introduction to neuroscience and "Mechanisms of Resistance to Oxidative Stress in the Central Nervous System," among others.
But she was an outspoken critic of many university policies too. She received a fairly good rating by the students.
Dr Maria Ragland Davis, professor of biotechnology and plant genomics; and Dr Adriel Johnson, professor of physiology, were the other two professors died.
Dr Joseph Leahy, professor of microbiology, and Stephanie Monticciolo, department assistant, were in critical condition Friday night; Dr. Luis Rogelio Cruz-Vera, professor of molecular biology, was stable.
