Salk Professor Samuel Pfaff named 2021 AAAS Fellow

January 26, 2022

Salk Professor Samuel Pfaff named 2021 AAAS Fellow

January 26, 2022

拉霍亚—索尔克教授 Samuel Pfaff has been named a 2021 Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world’s largest general scientific society and publisher of the journal 科学. Pfaff is among 564 new AAAS Fellows spanning 24 scientific disciplines who were nominated by their peers for their distinguished efforts to advance science.

“It is a great honor to be nominated as a AAAS Fellow, and Sam is very deserving of this recognition,” says Salk President 鲁斯蒂·盖奇. “His work understanding the basis of movement has led to scientific advances and the development of novel therapies for movement disorders, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).”

Pfaff is a professor in the Gene Expression Laboratory and holds the Benjamin H. Lewis Chair. His lab examines how specialized brain and spinal cord cells called motor neurons help people move. His research group is widely recognized for its identification of the genetic pathways that allow motor neurons to develop and grow connections to muscles, called axons. His team exploited its unique knowledge of motor neuron genetics to develop novel labeling tools that help reveal more about both motor circuitry and disease processes in order to develop new therapies. For example, his team worked with a group of San Diego scientists to develop a new therapy for people with ALS. Recently, they also found that disease-related genes often have different degrees to which they are turned on or off. In these cases, there is a tipping point: With only an incremental biological change around a critical threshold, a person can go from having no symptoms to being very sick.

关于美国科学促进会：
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) was founded in 1848 and includes more than 250 affiliated societies and academies of science, serving 10 million individuals. The nonprofit AAAS is open to all and fulfills its mission to “advance science and serve society” through initiatives in science policy, international programs, science education, public engagement, and more. For additional information about AAAS, see www.aaas.org.

关于索尔克生物研究所：
每一项治愈都有一个起点。索尔克研究所践行乔纳斯·索尔克将梦想变为现实的使命。其国际知名、屡获殊荣的科学家们探索生命的根本，在新万博app官方下载、遗传学、免疫学、植物生物学等方面寻求新的认知。该研究所是一个独立的非营利组织，也是一座建筑地标：有意识地保持精简，天性务实，并勇于面对任何挑战。无论是癌症还是阿尔茨海默病，衰老还是糖尿病，索尔克的治愈之路都从这里开始。了解更多： salk.edu.