Five HMS Researchers Receive NIH Director’s Awards

The National Institutes of Health has announced recipients of 2013 Director’s Awards, a program that encourages creative thinkers to pursue innovative ideas about biomedical and behavioral research.

Of the 78 awardees, five are affiliated with Harvard Medical School. The awards are intended to support visionary science that exhibits the potential to transform scientific fields and speed the translation of research into improved health. The NIH Common Fund supports these awards under the High-Risk, High-Reward program.

The program is divided into three separate awards: The Pioneer award, the New Innovator award, and the Transformative Research award.

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The Pioneer Award challenges investigators at all career levels to develop highly innovative approaches that have the potential to produce a high impact on a broad area of biomedical or behavioral research.

Recipient:

Vadim Gladyshev, HMS professor of medicine at Brigham And Women's Hospital

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The New Innovator Award supports investigators who are within 10 years of their terminal degree or clinical residency, but who have not yet received a Research Project Grant (R01) or equivalent NIH grant, to conduct exceptionally innovative research.

Recipient:

Jeffrey Dvorin, HMS assistant professor of pediatrics at Children’s Hospital Corporation

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The Transformative Research Awards Program promotes cross-cutting, interdisciplinary approaches and is open to individuals and teams of investigators who propose research that has the potential to create or overturn fundamental paradigms.

Recipients:

Peng Yin, HMS assistant professor of systems biology

George Church, HMS professor of genetics


The Early Independence Award provides a mechanism for exceptional early career scientists to move rapidly into independent research positions at U.S. institutions by essentially omitting the traditional post-doctoral training period.

Recipient:

Anupam Bapu Jena, HMS assistant professor of health care policy