2021 Judson Daland Prize
The 2021 recipient selected for the Judson Daland Prize in Clinical Investigation is Sergiu P. Paşca. Dr. Paşca is Kenneth T. Norris, Jr. Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Bonnie Uytengsu and Family Director of the Stanford Brain Organogenesis Program, and Director, Stanford Neuroscience Stem Cell Core, Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University. The 2021 Daland Prize was presented at the Society's November 2022 Meeting.
Sergiu Paşca pioneered novel approaches to investigate neuropsychiatric disorders by creating self-organizing, stem-based models of the human brain, including functional human circuits in a preparation he named assembloids. He creatively applied these innovative models to uncover mechanisms of several neuropsychiatric disorders, identify therapeutic targets, and reveal the power of molecular psychiatry.
Dr. Sergiu Paşca seeks to understand the rules that govern the assembly of the human brain and the molecular mechanisms that lead to psychiatric disease. His models have allowed him to map genetic variants associated with schizophrenia and autism onto human forebrain development and identify susceptible timepoints and cell types. At Stanford, he serves as the inaugural Bonnie Uytengsu and Family Director of the Stanford Brain Organogenesis Program– a university-wide effort to innovate and share advances in human brain disorders at Stanford and internationally. Taken together, these novel tools and discoveries made by Dr. Paşca are giving access, for the first time, to unique cellular aspects of human brain development and function and deciphering the molecular mechanisms of disease opening a new exciting era of molecular psychiatry.
The prize is named for Dr. Judson Daland, born in 1860, a prominent Philadelphia physician and outstanding figure in medical research who left the bulk of his estate to the Society to support research in clinical medicine. The prize recognizes outstanding achievement in clinical investigation, particularly patient-oriented research. The $50,000 prize is presented every 3 to 5 years. In addition to the prize, a Judson Daland Fellowship is awarded annually using these funds.
The Daland selection committee members are Clyde F. Barker (chair), former President, American Philosophical Society, Donald Guthrie Professor, Department of Surgery, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania; Lawrence H. Einhorn, Distinguished Professor, Livestrong Foundation Professor of Oncology, Professor of Medicine, Indiana University; Ronald M. Fairman, The Clyde F. Barker - William Maul Measey Professor of Surgery, Chief of Vascular Surgery and Endovascular Therapy, Vice-Chairman for Clinical Affairs, Department of Surgery, Professor of Surgery in Radiology, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania; and John N. Loeb, Professor Emeritus of Medicine, Columbia University.