Professor Heather Maynard has been chosen as the recipient of the American Chemical Society (ACS) 2019 Bioconjugate Chemistry Lectureship Award.
Maynard is being recognized for her “extensive contributions at the interface between chemistry, materials and biology that have moved forward our understanding and capabilities at the bio-nano interface”. View the official ACS announcement here.
The award will be presented to Maynard at the Bioconjugate Chemistry Lecturer Symposium, which is a symposium built around Maynard’s accomplishments with lectures by Maynard and other prominent researchers in her field. The symposium will be held at the Fall 2019 ACS National Meeting & Exposition, in San Diego, CA, August 25 – 29, 2019.
On August 27, 2019, at the UCLA Research Showcase and Reception in San Diego, we will toast Maynard and other UCLA faculty and alumni who are being honored by the ACS. Learn more about the event here.
Since 2016, the Bioconjugate Chemistry Lectureship has recognized an outstanding researcher for important recent advances in interfacing synthetic and biological systems. Recipients are chosen by the editors of the ACS journal Bioconjugate Chemistry and the ACS Division of Polymeric Materials Science and Engineering (PMSE).
Maynard holds UCLA’s Dr. Myung Ki Hong Endowed Chair in Polymer Science. She is a worldwide leader in the area of protein-polymer conjugates, which are important therapeutics for a variety of diseases. She develops new synthetic methods to make the materials, invents new polymers to improve properties such as stability, and demonstrates preclinical efficacy of her conjugates with an eye towards translation for human health. Maynard also works in the area of smart materials for precision medicine: materials that respond to disease states in the body.
Maynard’s research and teaching have been recognized by numerous awards and recognitions including most recently the American Chemical Society Arthur Cope Scholar Award, the UCLA Student Development Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Award, Fulbright Specialist Award, and election as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Maynard is also an American Chemical Society Polymer Chemistry and Polymer Materials: Science and Engineering, Leverhulme, Kavli Frontiers, and Royal Society of Chemistry Fellow. She was a member of the United States Defense Science Study Group from 2016-2017.
Maynard is Director of the Chemistry Biology Interface Training Program and Associate Director of Technology and Development for the California NanoSystems Institute.
To learn more about Maynard’s research, visit her group’s website.
Penny Jennings, Communications Manager, UCLA Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, penny@chem.ucla.edu.
