Professor Hideyoshi Harashima, of Hokkaido University, Japan, has been named as the latest recipient of the Høst Madsen Medal. The medal is awarded to recognise excellence in pharmaceutical sciences and is FIP’s highest scientific honour.

Professor Harashima read pharmacy at the University of Tokyo and for more than 30 years has worked in the fields of nanomedicine, gene therapy, nucleic acid medicine and drug delivery. He is currently chair of the Laboratory for Molecular Design of Pharmaceutics in Japan but, in 2009, also set up the Laboratory of Innovative Nanomedicine. He has published over 400 original papers and has developed a multifunctional envelope-type nano device (MEND) to control intracellular trafficking as well as the biodistribution of genetic materials such as siRNA/mRNA/pDNA to cure diseases with gene therapy and nucleic acid medicine.

Prof. Harashima said: “When I look at the list of Høst-Madsen medallists, there are famous names that I have seen in papers and textbooks — people whom I have long been interested in meeting as a pharmaceutical scientist. Being awarded this prestigious medal is an unexpected honour for me. It will encourage me to pursue new challenges in science.”

“Professor Harashima has made many highly innovative contributions in the field of drug delivery systems and is a most worthy recipient of the prestigious Høst-Madsen medal,” said Prof. Ross McKinnon, Chair of FIP’s Board of Pharmaceutical Sciences.

Prof. Harashima will be officially presented with the award on 15 September 2021 at 13:00 CEST, when he will also give the Høst Madsen Lecture entitled “MEND: from controlled intracellular trafficking to clinical application for nanomedicines”. More here.

More about Prof. Harashima’s work and career will be published in an interview in the International Pharmacy Journal next month.