Washington, DC—May 28, 2008—The 2008 American Society for Microbiology (ASM) Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics Young Investigator Award is being presented to Adrian M. Zelazny, Staff Scientist, Laboratory of Clinical Infectious Diseases, NIAID, National Institutes of Health (NIH). This award recognizes outstanding applied research in clinical microbiology or antimicrobial therapy.
Dr. Zelazny is honored for his work studying infection susceptibility and resistance, microbial virulence, and host/pathogen interactions at the NIH. Dr. Zelazny came to the NIH in 2003 on a Fogarty International Center Fellowship. As a Fellow, he developed a method using PCR assay to detect and identify Leishmania species in patient specimens, and was recognized for this work with the NIH Fellow's Award for Research Excellence in 2005. Dr. Zelazny is currently directing a project to use this assay method to detect and identify Mycobacteria and Nocardia species. In 2007, he received a NIH Director's Science Group Award for his role in the discovery of Granulobacter bethesdensis, and he has applied for a patent as co-inventor for the method of detection and identification of Mycobacterium using SecA.
Dr. Zelazny received his B.S. in Clinical Biochemistry from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina, and his Ph.D. degree in Biochemistry from the Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel.
The Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics Young Investigator Award will be presented during the 108th General Meeting of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), June 1 – June 5, 2008 in Boston, Massachusetts. ASM is the world's oldest and largest life science organization and has more than 43,000 members worldwide. ASM's mission is to advance the microbiological sciences and promote the use of scientific knowledge for improved health and economic and environmental well-being.