Chad Mirkin, Ph.D was recently named the winner of the $500,000 Lemelson-MIT Prize. The Lemelson-MIT Program nurtures and honors inventors of all ages through outreach programs and grants as well as the coveted Lemelson-MIT Prize. The program began in 1994 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and is funded by the Lemelson Foundation, which was created to honor Jerome Lemelson, an inventor whose creations covered a plethora of fields. This esteemed prize not only recognizes Dr. Mirkin as a great scientist but also acknowledges his accomplishments as an inventor.
As a scientist, inventor and entrepreneur, Dr. Mirkin has spent his scientific career developing nanotechnology that makes a great contribution to the healthcare field. Nanotechnology deals with the development of devices that can study extremely small particles – as tiny as 1/10,000 of the width of a human hair. Specifically, Dr. Mirkin's cutting edge technology – called the Verigene System from Nanosphere – can selectively analyze DNA for the early stages of a variety of diseases.
While this Verigene System is a highly sensitive piece of technology, it is also meant to simplify the process of studying the early stages of diseases with great accuracy. The Verigene System is comprised of a Reader and Processor. From start to finish, each test takes less than two hours with only about twenty minutes of hands-on time from a lab technician. Not only is the Verigene System used to help those who may be at-risk for developing certain diseases, it can also determine if patients have the potential of passing inherited diseases on to their children.
"MIT's recognition of both Dr. Mirkin's ground-breaking science and the promise of nanotechnology further validates the advances we make every day in improving healthcare and patient outcomes," said William P. Moffitt, president and chief executive officer of Nanosphere. Nanosphere – co-founded nearly a decade ago by Dr. Mirkin – abides by a mission to "improve the diagnosis and treatment of disease by enabling earlier access to, and detection of, new and existing biomarkers."
As life expectancy increases with each generation, it is critical to the health and wellness of the population to pinpoint and diagnose diseases in their early stages. Scientific advances have made certain cancers nearly 100% curable – if diagnosed early – and the spread of some inherited diseases more manageable. Dr. Mirkin's receipt of the Lemelson-MIT Prize not only brings recognition to his library of work in the healthcare field and the study of nanotechnology, it also recognizes and encourages other inventors to pursue their innovative ideas.
