Dr. Richard Heller
is awarded the 2024 SIVB Distinguished Scientist Award
It is with great pleasure that we recognize Dr. Richard Heller as the 2024 Distinguished Scientist Award recipient from the IVACS section. Dr. Heller a member of the SIVB since 1992 and his remarkable achievements as a scientist and great service to the society make him an ideal candidate for this award,
Richard Heller, Ph.D., is Professor of Medical Engineering at the University of South Florida. Dr. Heller received his B.S. degree in Microbiology from Oregon State University, and a Ph.D. in Medical Sciences from the University of South Florida, College of Medicine. He is recognized as a pioneer in developing efficient delivery systems for nucleic acids and chemotherapeutics, and the leading expert in gene electrotransfer. He spent most of his career at the University of South Florida becoming a full professor in 2004 and Co-Director of the Florida Center of Excellence for Biomolecular Identification and Targeted Delivery in 2006. He moved to Old Dominion University, College of Health Science, Norfolk, VA as Professor and Eminent Scholar (2008-2019) and now is back at the University of South as a professor in the Department of Medical Engineering (2019-present).
Dr. Heller has been extremely successful as a researcher starting as a graduate student when he received the Honor B. Fell award from the SIVB (1989). Since then he has published 141 peer-reviewed manuscripts, 25 book chapters and edited 5 books. He has been invited to give over 100 presentation of his work in seminars around the world. One area of focus has been diseases of the skin. He developed technologies to facilitate delivery of genetic material to the skin. He also led the first clinical trial utilizing gene electrotransfer to evaluate a potential for treatment of melanoma. Those of us who have heard his presentations at the SIVB annual meetings can also appreciate that he must be a consummate teacher.
Those of us who have been with the SIVB for more decades than we care to admit will remember the tremendous contributions that Richard made to the preservation of our society. We don’t say this lightly. He was elected to the Executive Board (now the Board of Directors) in 1996-2000 and to society treasurer in 2002-2008. The issues were two fold; “political” with considerable friction between the animal and plant parts of the society and “economic” with the real chance that the society would go bankrupt. As treasurer, Richard worked tirelessly with the business office and the Board of Directors to constrain spending and develop budget policies that maintained our capital and made sure that the annual meeting would remain within a defined and sensible budget. Marietta Saunders often said privately how much she appreciated his efforts and how instrumental they were to our final success (Recognizing also how much she contributed to that success.) As an officer of the society, he worked quietly to bring all sides together with an understanding that the society was greater than the sum of its parts and that unity should be preserved.
Dr. Heller epitomizes the qualities of a distinguished scientist and a major contributor to the SIVB and so it is a great pleasure to see this award presented to him.
Submitted by Michael Dame and John W. Harbell
