ASCI / Emerging-Generation Awards, 2024
The Emerging Generation Awards (E-Gen Awards) recognize post-MD, pre-faculty appointment physician-scientists who are meaningfully engaged in immersive research.
About the awardee
Richard Voit, MD, PhD is a pediatric hematologist/oncologist and a physician-scientist whose scientific passion is understanding the dysregulation of hematopoietic stem cells in bone marrow failure and leukemia, and using those insights to develop safer and more effective cancer treatments and hematopoietic gene therapies. He completed his medical and graduate school training at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center where he worked in the lab of Dr. Matthew Porteus to develop genome engineering approaches to treat HIV infection and sickle cell disease. Richard went on to pursue a general pediatrics residency followed by a pediatric hematology/oncology fellowship at Boston Children's Hospital and the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. He is currently a clinical instructor and post-doctoral researcher in the lab of Dr. Vijay Sankaran.
Motivated by the clinical observation of severe and early-onset bone marrow failure in neonates with mutations is the transcription factor MECOM, Dr. Voit uncovered an essential gene network controlled by MECOM that is indispensable for stem cell maintenance. He found that this same gene network is dysregulated in acute myeloid leukemias that have particularly poor clinical outcomes. He is currently investigating co-regulators of this network and studying targeted approaches to interfere with MECOM signaling in leukemia. In addition, by combining his background in gene therapy research with his current focus on stem cell biology, Dr. Voit is developing novel therapeutic approaches to treat and cure genetic hematologic disorders through gene and cell therapy.