Vijay Sankaran, HMS professor of pediatrics at Boston Children’s Hospital, has been named to receive the Trailblazer Prize for Clinician-Scientists by the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health. The Trailblazer Prize recognizes early-career clinician-scientists whose research has the potential to lead to novel approaches for diagnosing, preventing, treating, or curing disease and disability.
Sankaran was recognized for his significant advances in the understanding of human blood cell development in health and diseases including sickle cell anemia, cancer, and rare blood disorders. He discovered the function of a particular gene involved in blood production that, when suppressed using the CRISPR gene-editing technology or a technique known as RNA interference, could treat sickle cell anemia. Sankaran and his lab have also devised a method to triple the production of red blood cells, which could lead to better, cheaper methods of manufacturing these cells for transfusion.
“Dr. Sankaran’s pioneering studies in genetics and hematology paved the way for a novel sickle cell disease treatment involving the CRISPR gene-editing technology, becoming the first gene therapy approved by the Food and Drug Administration,” said Julie Gerberding, CEO and president of the FNIH.
“This approach can serve as a blueprint for the development of other gene editing therapies and represents the innovative thinking that’s a hallmark of Trailblazer Prize recipients,” Gerberding said.
Sankaran will receive the Trailblazer Award at the FNIH annual awards ceremony in October in Washington, D.C.
Four HMS research fellows have been named 2024 Jane Coffin Childs Fellows by the Jane Coffin Childs Fund for Medical Research (JCC). The JCC Fellowship supports promising postdoctoral fellows researching cancer and other diseases. The 26 new JCC Fellows will be awarded three-year stipends, totaling more than $7 million.
“We are proud to be able to support this new cohort of outstanding postdoctoral fellows who have made important contributions during graduate school and developed exciting new directions to pursue,” said Sue Biggins, chair of the JCC’s Board of Scientific Advisors.
The four JCC Fellows from HMS are:
- Ibraheem Alshareedah, HMS research fellow in pediatrics at Boston Children’s Hospital. Alshareedah’s research in the lab of Taekjip Ha takes a novel approach to investigate DNA break repair.
- Yanyan Hu, HMS research fellow in medicine at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, whose research in the lab of William Kaelin focuses on discovering new biomarkers to help diagnose, monitor, and treat cancer.
- Shijia Liu, research fellow in neurobiology in the Blavatnik Institute at HMS. In the lab of Bernardo Sabatini, Liu investigates the neural mechanisms and pathways underlying voluntary stop decisions.
- Noah Pettit, research fellow in neurobiology at HMS. Pettit’s research in the lab of Rachel Wilson uses fruit fly interactions with wind direction to understand how neural circuits perform the computations necessary for navigation.
Established by the Childs family in 1937 to honor the memory of Jane Coffin Childs, JCC’s mission has broadened from supporting research into the causes and treatment of cancer to supporting fundamental scientific research that advances our understanding of the causes, treatments, and cures for human disease.
Two HMS students and their faculty advisers have been named to the 2024 cohort of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Gilliam Fellows Program. The program recognizes student-adviser pairs for their outstanding research and their commitment to advancing equity and inclusion in science.
The Gilliam Fellows Program provides each student-adviser pair with $53,000 in support each year for up to three years of the student’s dissertation research. Fellows are also offered leadership training, professional development, and opportunities to engage with and learn from peers, program alumni, and HHMI scientists.
The new Gilliam Fellows from HMS are:
- Olumide Fagboyegun, a Harvard Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences doctoral student in the Program in Neuroscience at HMS, and his adviser, Beth Stevens, HMS associate professor of neurology at Boston Children’s Hospital.
- Ella Perrault, a Harvard Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences doctoral student in the Program in Neuroscience at HMS, and her adviser, William Hwang, HMS assistant professor of radiation oncology at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Five researchers from Harvard Medical School have been named among 26 new HHMI Investigators by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI).
HHMI supports investigators to do research that radically changes our understanding of how biology works, pushing the boundaries of basic biological and biomedical sciences and working across scientific disciplines in a wide range of organisms.
Each investigator will receive roughly $11 million in support over a seven-year term, which is renewable indefinitely pending successful scientific review. This support includes their full salary and benefits, a research budget, scientific equipment, and additional resources.
The new HHMI Investigators from HMS are:
- Jonathan Abraham, associate professor of microbiology in the Blavatnik Institute at HMS.
- Edward Chouchani, HMS associate professor of cell biology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
- Steven McCarroll, the Dorothy and Milton Flier Professor of Biomedical Science and Genetics at HMS and director of genomic neurobiology in the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.
- Vijay Sankaran, HMS professor of pediatrics at Boston Children’s Hospital.
- Sichen (Susan) Shao, associate professor of cell biology in the Blavatnik Institute at HMS.
Read more about HMS’ new HHMI Investigators.
