Day 1 of the two-day Personalized Medicine World Conference (PMWC) 2017 at Duke (May 24-25) ended with the presentation of Pioneer and Luminary awards to major contributors to the advance of precision medicine. The PMWC Luminary Award recognizes recent contributions of preeminent figures who have accelerated personalized medicine into the clinical marketplace. The PMWC Pioneer Award is given to rare individuals who presaged the advent of personalized medicine when less evolved technology and encouragement from peers existed, but still made major advances in the field. This year, the PMWC honored Francis Collins (Director, NIH), Elaine Mardis (Co-Director, Genomics Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital), and Keith Yamamoto (Vice Chancellor Research, UCSF) with the Luminary Award. For the Pioneer Award, Kathy Giusti (photo) (Founder of the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation and Co-Chair, HBS Kraft Precision Medicine Accelerator), and Mark Levin (Co-Founder & Partner, Third Rock Ventures) were recognized. Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD, is a highly revered physician-geneticist who, as Director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, oversaw the successful 15-year multibillion-dollar effort to sequence the human genome. Often considered the most significant scientific undertaking of our time, researchers around the globe are now able to use genomic tools to expand understanding of human biology, combat disease and improve health through precision medicine.Login Or Register To Read Full Story