PHILADELPHIA — Garret FitzGerald, MD, chair of the Department of Pharmacology and Director of the Institute for Translational Medicine & Therapeutics, Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, is among the 44 newly elected Fellows and eight newly elected Foreign Members to the Royal Society.
"Science impacts on most aspects of modern life, improving our understanding of the world and playing an increasing role as we grapple with problems such as feeding a growing global population and keeping an aging population healthy. These scientists who have been elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society are among the world's finest. They follow in the footsteps of luminaries such as Newton, Darwin and Einstein and I am delighted to welcome them into our ranks," noted Sir Paul Nurse, President of the Royal Society.
FitzGerald, also professor of Medicine and Pharmacology and the McNeil Professor in Translational Medicine and Therapeutics, takes an integrative approach to elucidating the mechanisms of drug action. He was the first to describe the dose-dependent suppression by aspirin of thromboxane and prostacyclin in humans and animal models. This body of research contributed substantially to the development of low-dose aspirin as a preventive approach to heart disease. His group was the first to predict and then explain mechanistically the cardiovascular hazard from NSAIDs. His team was also the first to discover a molecular clock in the cardiovascular system, which has contributed substantially to the understanding of the importance of peripheral clocks in the regulation of cardiovascular and metabolic function.
"I am deeply honored by this recognition of the efforts and accomplishments of those with whom I have been privileged to work," said FitzGerald.
The Royal Society is a self-governing fellowship of many of the world's most distinguished scientists drawn from all areas of science, engineering, and medicine. The Society's fundamental purpose, as it has been since its foundation in 1660, is to recognize, promote, and support excellence in science and to encourage the development and use of science for the benefit of humanity.
Penn Medicine is one of the world’s leading academic medical centers, dedicated to the related missions of medical education, biomedical research, excellence in patient care, and community service. The organization consists of the University of Pennsylvania Health System and Penn’s Raymond and Ruth Perelman School of Medicine, founded in 1765 as the nation’s first medical school.
The Perelman School of Medicine is consistently among the nation's top recipients of funding from the National Institutes of Health, with $550 million awarded in the 2022 fiscal year. Home to a proud history of “firsts” in medicine, Penn Medicine teams have pioneered discoveries and innovations that have shaped modern medicine, including recent breakthroughs such as CAR T cell therapy for cancer and the mRNA technology used in COVID-19 vaccines.
The University of Pennsylvania Health System’s patient care facilities stretch from the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania to the New Jersey shore. These include the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, Chester County Hospital, Lancaster General Health, Penn Medicine Princeton Health, and Pennsylvania Hospital—the nation’s first hospital, founded in 1751. Additional facilities and enterprises include Good Shepherd Penn Partners, Penn Medicine at Home, Lancaster Behavioral Health Hospital, and Princeton House Behavioral Health, among others.
Penn Medicine is an $11.1 billion enterprise powered by more than 49,000 talented faculty and staff.