MONTREAL, Sept. 28, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The Oligonucleotide Therapeutics Society (OTS) has announced its 2016 Award Series as part of its 2016 Annual Meeting held September 25-28, 2016 in Montréal, Quebec, Canada. This year the OTS is recognizing four outstanding scientists for their contributions to the field of oligonucleotide therapeutics.
OTS is honored to recognize Dr. Stanley T. Crooke, founder, chairman and CEO of Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Inc., as the recipient of the 2016 OTS Lifetime Achievement Award. Dr. Crooke has made a lifetime of outstanding contributions to the field of oligonucleotide therapeutics through education, research, and therapeutic application. Dr. Crooke founded Ionis Pharmaceuticals to create a new platform for drug discovery and development called antisense technology. Dr. Crooke and Ionis developed the first antisense drugs to achieve marketing authorization. Today, with over three dozen RNA-targeted drugs in development, he has built one of the largest and most advanced pipelines of drugs in the biotechnology industry. Dr. Crooke will give a plenary lecture at the 2016 OTS Annual Meeting on Wednesday, September 28, 2016 from 9:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. EDT.
Dr. Mayumi Takahashi of the Beckman Research Institute at City of Hope is the recipient of this year's Gewirtz Memorial Scholarship Award. The Gewirtz Memorial Scholarship Award is given annually by the OTS as a tribute to Dr. Alan Gewirtz and his lifetime of contributions to the field of oligonucleotide therapeutics. Dr. Takahashi is acknowledged for her contributions to the field of oligonucleotide therapeutics through her impactful research toward improving the treatment of patients with human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV. Dr. Takahashi will be presented with her award and will give a brief talk on her research at the 2016 OTS Annual Meeting on Wednesday, September 28, 2016 at 8:30 a.m. EDT.
Dr. Aurélie Goyenvalle of the University of Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines is the recipient of this year's Young Investigator Award. Dr. Goyenvalle is acknowledged for her dedicated research toward developing new gene therapy strategies based on splicing modulation for neuromuscular disorders, such as Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. Dr. Goyenvalle will be presented with her award and will give a brief talk on her research at the 2016 OTS Annual Meeting on Wednesday, September 28, 2016 at 8:50 a.m. EDT.
The recipient of this year's Paper of the Year Award is Dr. Victor Serebrov of the RNA Therapeutics Institute at UMass Medical Center. Dr. Serebrov is acknowledged for his manuscript titled, "Single-Molecule Imaging Reveals that Argonaute Reshapes the Binding Properties of Its Nucleic Acid Guides," which was published in Cell. Dr. Serebrov will be presented with his award and will give a brief talk on his publication at the 2016 OTS Annual Meeting on Wednesday, September 28, 2016 at 9:10 a.m. EDT.
"The OTS is proud of its longstanding commitment to the field of oligonucleotide therapeutics and congratulates each of its award winners, and is appreciative for their continued contributions to this important field," said Dr. Brett Monia, president of the OTS and senior vice president of drug discovery and corporate development at Ionis Pharmaceuticals. "The OTS recognizes both distinguished individuals who have made remarkable contributions to the field over the lifetime of their career, as well as talented, young scientists."
The Oligonucleotide Therapeutics Society is an open, nonprofit forum to foster academia and industry-based research and development of oligonucleotide therapeutics. For more information on OTS, visit its website, http://www.oligotherapeutics.org.
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SOURCE Oligonucleotide Therapeutics Society