University of Texas (UT) Southwestern Medical Center physician-geneticist Helen Helen Hobbs, M.D., is the 2015 recipient of the prestigious Pearl Meister Greengard Prize. The prize recognizes Dr. Hobbs’ research, which advances understanding of heart disease and other complex disorders. The work of Dr. Hobbs, Director of the Eugene McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development at UT Southwestern and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, is credited with leading to new therapeutics to lower LDL cholesterol. She will receive the prize on November 17 in a ceremony at The Rockefeller University in New York City. The international award from Rockefeller, which celebrates the achievements of outstanding women in biomedical science, was established by Dr. Paul Greengard, a biophysicist and Vincent Astor Professor at the Rockefeller, and his wife, Ursula von Rydingsvard, a sculptor. The $100,000 annual prize is named in honor of Dr. Greengard’s mother, who died giving birth to him. It is funded by Dr. Greengard’s donation of his monetary share of the 2000 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (shared among three scientists for discoveries concerning signal transduction in the nervous system), as well as donations from other generous Rockefeller supporters. “Dr. Hobbs’ work is nothing short of inspirational – she is unraveling the genetic underpinnings of cardiovascular disease and changing the way we look at one of the most common, complex health issues of our time,” said Dr. Greengard. Since 1999, Dr. Hobbs has led the Dallas Heart Study, a longitudinal, multiethnic, population-based investigation of risk factors underlying cardiovascular disease, the nation’s leading cause of death for both men and women. The study, originally funded by the Donald W.Login Or Register To Read Full Story