2024 Dickson Prize in Medicine
Leslie B. Vosshall, PhD
Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer, Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Robin Chemers Neustein Professor and Head of the Laboratory of Neurogenetics and Behavior at The Rockefeller University
Bio
Leslie B. Vosshall, PhD, vice president and chief scientific officer, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and Robin Chemers Neustein Professor and head of the Laboratory of Neurogenetics and Behavior at The Rockefeller University, has been selected to receive the 2024 Dickson Prize in Medicine, the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine’s highest honor.
Vosshall, a molecular neurobiologist, was chosen for her foundational work on the genetic basis of chemosensory behavior in insects and humans.
Her lab’s research program in human olfactory perception has led to discoveries in the
genetic basis of smell disorders and how odor stimuli are converted to olfactory percepts. Her research group is translating this work to produce a novel clinical test for smell dysfunction.
Beginning in 2008, the group established a mosquito genetics research program to understand host-seeking and blood-feeding behaviors in the mosquito. They focus on Aedes aegypti, the mosquito associated with yellow fever, dengue and Zika viruses. These mosquitoes have evolved an intense attraction to human body odor, body heat and carbon dioxide—the gas exhaled in human breath—and serve as deadly vectors of infectious disease.
Vosshall’s lab was the first to use CRISPR-Cas9 genome-editing in this species and led the effort to resequence, reassemble and reannotate the genome of this deadly vector mosquito. The work
has shed light on how these mosquitoes integrate sensory cues to hunt humans and is catalyzing investigations throughout the world.
Vosshall, who holds a PhD from The Rockefeller University, is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Medicine and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Dickson Prize in Medicine Winners
2020
2010
2000
2000 Elizabeth H. Blackburn, PhD
1999 James E. Darnell Jr., MD
1998 Richard D. Klausner, MD
1997 Edward E. Harlow Jr., PhD,
and Eric S. Lander, PhD
1996 Philippa Marrack, PhD
1995 Ronald M. Evans, PhD
1994 Bert Vogelstein, MD
1993 Stanley B. Prusiner, MD
1992 Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD
1991 Phillip A. Sharp, PhD
1990
1990 Ernst Knobil, PhD
1989 Bernard Moss, MD, PhD
1988 Leroy E. Hood, MD, PhD
1987 Elvin A. Kabat, PhD
1986 J. Michael Bishop, MD
1985 Robert C. Gallo, MD
1984 Solomon H. Snyder, MD
1983 Eric R. Kandel, MD
1982 Francis H. Ruddle, PhD
1981 Philip Leder, MD
1980
1980 David H. Hubel, MD,
and Torsten N. Wiesel, MD
1979 Bert W. O’Malley, MD
1978 Paul Greengard, PhD
1977 Roger Guillemin, MD, PhD
1976 Frank J. Dixon, MD
1975 Elizabeth F. Neufeld, PhD
1974 Stephen W. Kuffler, MD
1973 John H. Gibbon Jr., MD
1972 Solomon A. Berson, MD,
and Rosalyn S. Yalow, PhD
1971 Earl W. Sutherland Jr., MD