Huda Y. Zoghbi, MD, a physician-scientist known internationally for her extraordinary range of discoveries in neurology and neuroscience, is the recipient of the 2015 Vanderbilt Prize in Biomedical Science.

Zoghbi is a professor in the Departments of Pediatrics, Molecular and Human Genetics, Neurology and Neuroscience at Baylor College of Medicine, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator and director of the Jan and Dan Duncan Neurological Research Institute at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston. She is the 10th recipient of the Vanderbilt Prize in Biomedical Science, established by Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in 2006. Zoghbi will receive her award on April 21, 2016 when she delivers a Flexner Discovery Lecture.

A native of Lebanon, she began medical school in Beirut but transferred to Meharry Medical College because of civil war in her homeland. Much of her research has focused on Rhett syndrome and spinocerebellar ataxia type 1 (SCA1). After joining the Baylor faculty in 1988, and in collaboration with Harry Orr, PhD, at the University of Minnesota, Zoghbi helped identify the mutant gene responsible for SCA1. Their work shed light on the role that abnormal proteins and protein misfolding play in neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Another line of inquiry led to the discovery of a gene that is essential for the generation of inner ear hair cells. The discovery encouraged development of potential gene therapy approaches for deafness.