The Dickson Prize, Pitt School of Medicine's highest honor, will be presented next week to Leslie Vosshall, a leading expert on the diseases mosquitoes transmit to humans.

Vosshall, vice president and chief scientific officer, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and professor and head of the Laboratory of Neurogenetics and Behavior at The Rockefeller University, will speak on “The Unbreakable Attraction of Mosquitoes to Humans,” beginning at 2:30 p.m. Sept. 27 in the auditorium of Alan Magee Scaife Hall or by Zoom at https://pitt.zoom.us/j/94757965854.

A post-lecture panel, featuring Pitt professors working in complementary areas, includes Claire Cheetham, assistant professor of neurobiology, School of Medicine; Nathan Clark, associate professor of biological sciences, Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences; Sarah E. Ross, associate professor of neurobiology and of anesthesiology and perioperative medicine, School of Medicine; and William R. Stauffer, assistant professor of neurobiology, School of Medicine.

The Dickson Prize in Medicine is awarded annually to an American biomedical researcher who has made significant, progressive contributions to medicine.  Vosshall, a molecular neurobiologist, was chosen for her foundational work on the genetic basis of chemosensory behavior in insects and humans.

Her lab’s research program in human olfactory perception has led to discoveries in the genetic basis of smell disorders and how odor stimuli are converted to olfactory percepts. Her research group is translating this work to produce a novel clinical test for smell dysfunction.

Beginning in 2008, the group established a mosquito genetics research program to understand host-seeking and blood-feeding behaviors in the mosquito. They focus on Aedes aegypti, the mosquito associated with yellow fever, dengue and Zika viruses. These mosquitoes have evolved an intense attraction to human body odor, body heat and carbon dioxide — the gas exhaled in human breath — and serve as deadly vectors of infectious disease.