Viral Immunologist Dr. Kizzmekia "Kizzy" Corbett (age 35) will receive the inaugural Benjamin Franklin NextGen Award for her leadership in battling the most important public health challenge of our time-COVID-19. Citation: For her outstanding contributions to the field of viral immunology and vaccine development, including an mRNA-based vaccine to combat the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, cause of the COVID-19 pandemic. Kizzy Corbett grew up in a small town in North Carolina. She was drawn toward science at a young age. By the age of 16, she was already recognized for her academic talent and potential as a scientist;the American Chemical Society recruited her to participate in a two-year enrichment program for talented disadvantaged high school students. She went on to get a double degree in Biological Sciences and Sociology at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. During this time, she was selected as a Meyerhoff scholar and recognized as an NIH scholar. As an NIH scholar, she spent her summers working with Dr. Barney Graham on Respiratory Syncytia Virus (RSV) at the Vaccine Research Center (VRC) within the NIH. Following this, she pursued her Ph.D. degree with Professor Aravinda de Silva at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, where she studied immune responses to dengue virus. Subsequently, she returned to the VRC and focused on mechanisms of viral immunity in order to develop vaccines for influenza and coronavirus. As the COVID-19 pandemic developed in December 2019, she started focusing on the virus responsible for the outbreak, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) CoV-2 virus. When the RNA genome sequence of SARS CoV-2 became available in early January of 2020, she was asked to lead a group of highly talented scientists to develop the preclinical work for a novel vaccine to the SARS CoV-2, mRNA-1273. Because of her extensive expertise in mechanisms of viral immunity, her group was able to develop a successful vaccine. In an unprecedented effort, her group was able to bring the vaccine to phase 1 clinical trials in just 66 days. The mRNA-1273 vaccine was approved for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration on December 10, 2020.
2021 Benjamin Franklin NextGen Award presented to Kizzmekia S. Corbett, Ph.D