UF diabetes researcher garners award

The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International has selected University of Florida researcher Mark Atkinson as this year’s recipient of the Gerold & Kayla Grodsky Award.

One of only two major scientific honors the organization gives annually, this award is presented to a Ph.D. researcher who has made outstanding scientific contributions to diabetes research. Atkinson will receive the award May 18 in New York.

Atkinson was acknowledged for his research into the use of immune system markers to identify at-risk individuals and was praised for his scientific contributions to the implementation of the national Diabetes Prevention Trial-1, which aims to find whether diabetes can be prevented or delayed in humans through daily oral capsules or low-dose injections of insulin. His efforts to explain the benefits of research to family members of those with diabetes also were recognized.

Atkinson is the Sebastian Family/American Diabetes Association professor for diabetes research at UF's College of Medicine and director of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation Gene Therapy Center for the Prevention of Diabetes and Its Complications at UF and the University of Miami.