Applied Drug Delivery Institute Recognises Tomorrow's Life Science Innovators in Global Awards

The Catalent Applied Drug Delivery Institute and the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) have announced the winners of the “Global Academic Competition for Life Science Leaders of Tomorrow.”

The competition aims to identify emerging scientific talent, foster drug delivery education and reward academic excellence. The four winning entries, chosen from leading US and international European universities with graduate programs in pharmaceutical science, each receive $2000 (USD), a complimentary, one-year membership to the AAPS, and the potential opportunity to have their review published in a peer-reviewed journal.

The 2015 winners are:
•         Marius Hittinger and Nicole Schneider-Daum from Helmholtz-Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland, for their submission “Cell And Tissue-Based in vitro Improving the Development of Oral Inhalation Drug Products”

•         Mania Dorrani and Bozena Michniak-Kohn of Rutgers University for “Topical siRNA Delivery: Challenges and Prospects”

•         Harini Venkata Krishnan and Shilpa Sant from University of Pittsburgh for “Three Dimensional Cell Cultures: Opportunities for Drug Discovery and Development” and;

•         Zhijian He, Daria Alakhova, Alexander V. Kabanov University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for “Nanoformulations of Taxanes.”

“Our goal, for the competition, and for the Institute itself, is to foster education, collaboration and adoption of innovative drug delivery technologies to develop better treatments for patients,” commented Sharon Johnson, Catalent’s Senior VP, Quality, Product Development & Regulatory Affairs. “The standard of entries in this year’s competition was exceptional. We congratulate all the winners and look forward to sharing their reviews with the wider drug delivery community.”

Established in 2012, the Catalent Applied Drug Delivery Institute employs a multi-tiered approach to accelerate the adoption of advanced drug delivery technologies through industry and academic collaboration, research, education, and the sharing of information. In June 2014, the Institute created the Non-Invasive Macro-Molecule Drug Delivery Consortium (NMDC) and established a number of working groups looking at alternative delivery routes to injection for biologics and other large molecule therapeutics. The working groups include oral, pulmonary/nasal, ocular and transdermal delivery and welcome new members who wish to support innovation in non-invasive drug delivery.