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Ruslan Medzhitov Wins 2010 Lewis S. Rosensteil Award

The 2007 Blavatnik Award winner is recognized for distinguished work in basic medical science.

Published January 15, 2010

Ruslan Medzhitov, a winner of the 2007 Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists, has been awarded the 2010 Lewis S. Rosenstiel Award for Distinguished Work in Basic Medical Science. Medzhitov is the David W. Wallace Professor of Immunobiology at the Yale School of Medicine and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. The Rosenstiel Award, founded in 1972 at Brandeis University, has a long record of identifying and honoring pioneering scientists who have subsequently been honored with the Lasker Award and Nobel Prize.

The award to Medzhitov is for his “elucidation of the mechanisms of innate immunity,” according to the Rosenstiel Center. Medzhitov’s studies helped shed light on the critical role of toll-like receptors in sensing microbial infections, mechanisms of TLR signaling and activation of the inflammatory and immune response.

Medzhitov says, "Recent discoveries of TLRs and other pattern recognition receptors uncovered the key pathways that control immune responses. Targeting these receptors should help to manipulate the immune system with vaccines and other interventions.”

Medals are presented annually by the Rosenstiel Basic Medical Sciences Research Center at Brandeis on the basis of recommendations of a panel of outstanding scientists. Awards are given to scientists for recent discoveries of particular originality and importance to basic medical research. A $30,000 prize and a medal accompany each award. Sharing the award for his work in innate immunity is Jules Hoffman, Research Director and Member of the Board of Administrators of the National Center of Scientific Research, University Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg, France.