Dyann Wirth was honored by the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH) with the Joseph Augustin LePrince Medal for “outstanding work in the field of malariology.” Wirth, who is Richard Pearson Strong Professor of Infectious Diseases and chair of the Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, received the award at the ASTMH annual meeting on October 25, 2015 in Philadelphia.
Wirth is an international leader in malaria research and an expert in the molecular biology of tropical disease. She and the members of her lab leverage genomic tools and novel approaches to better understand the fundamental biology of the malaria parasite and mechanisms of drug resistance. The long-term goal of this work is to understand basic molecular mechanisms in protozoan parasites with the aim of discovering and applying preventive and therapeutic interventions against infection. She is director of the Harvard’s Defeating Malaria: From the Genes to the Globe initiative at Harvard Chan School and co-director of the Infectious Disease Program at the Broad Institute.
Photo: Ben Gebo