Paul Knoepfler

Oh well, it’s going to be another year of disappointment for me. Not only did I fail to get any Nobel Prize (I figured my blogs might give me a shot at Literature after they gave it to Bob Dylan last year), but I didn’t get a MacArthur Genius Award. Now I find out I haven’t even made the short list for the Stem Cell Person of the Year.

The Stem Cell Person of the Year award is given by UC Davis researcher, avid blogger and CIRM Grantee Paul Knoepfler. (You can vote for the Stem Cell Person of the Year here). In his blog, The Niche, Paul lists the qualities he looks for:

“The Stem Cell Person of the Year Award is an honor I give out to the person in any given year who in my view has had the most positive impact in outside-the-box ways in the stem cell and regenerative medicine field. I’m looking for creative risk-takers.”

“It’s not about who you know, but what you do to help science, medicine, and other people.”

Paul invites people to nominate worthy individuals – this year there are 20 nominees – people vote on which one of the nominees they think should win, and then Paul makes the final decision. Well, it is his blog and he is putting up the $2,000 prize money himself.

This year’s nominees are nothing if not diverse, including

• Anthony Atala, a pioneering researcher at Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine in North Carolina
• Bao-Ngoc Nguyen, who helped create California’s groundbreaking new law targeting clinics which offer unproven stem cell therapies
• Judy Roberson, a tireless patient advocate, and supporter of stem cell research for Huntington’s disease

Whoever wins will be following in some big footsteps including patient advocates Ted Harada and Roman Reed, as well as scientists like Jeanne Loring, Masayo Takahashi,  and Elena Cattaneo.

So vote early, vote often.

LINK: Vote for the 2017 Stem Cell Person of the Year