Air to Breathe – Pathways to Commercializing Academic Discoveries

Thursday, May 1 | 3-5 pm

BU Medical Campus, Hiebert Lounge
72 East Concord Street 

In this series of lightning talks, BU faculty and industry experts will address the challenges associated with developing treatments for lung disease. Each presenter will offer insights into how academic discoveries can be brought to market through collaboration with industry. Speakers will also share their experiences balancing the competing priorities of teaching and research, while still finding time to cultivate key relationships with industry and bring new products to market. The talks will be followed by a moderated Q&A.

The event also includes the presentation of the BU Innovator of the Year Award to Dr. Darrell Kotton, professor of medicine and founding director of the Center for Regenerative Medicine.

About the Innovator of the Year

Doctor Darrell Kotton, Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine (MED), is the founding director of the Center for Regenerative Medicine of Boston University and Boston Medical Center. His basic research laboratory, funded by the NIH, focuses on lung regeneration and stem cell biology. He also serves on the NIH’s National Heart Lung and Blood Institute’s Board of External Experts.

As a physician-scientist, Dr. Kotton holds dual roles with Boston Medical Center (BMC) and Boston University Chobanian and Avedesian School of Medicine (MED). His attending physician duties at BMC are in pulmonary and critical care medicine. On the MED campus, Dr. Kotton is the David C. Seldin Professor in the department of medicine and in the department of pathology and laboratory medicine

Dr. Kotton holds positions as an Allen Distinguished Investigator, a Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group advised program of the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation. He is also an elected member of the American Society of Clinical Investigators and the Association of American Physicians.

Throughout his career, Dr. Kotton has received numerous prestigious awards, including the American Thoracic Society’s “Recognition Award for Scientific Accomplishments” (2018), the AAMC inaugural national “Research Resources Sharing Award” (2017), the Alpha-1 Foundation’s “Researcher of the Year” (2013) and “Shillelagh” (2010) Awards, Boston University’s Graduate Medical Sciences Educator of the Year Award (2018), and the Robert Dawes Evans Senior Research Mentor Award from Boston University.