Obesity pioneer to give Gairdner lecture Oct. 26

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[img_inline align=”right” src=”http://padnws01.mcmaster.ca/images/Coleman_Douglas.jpg” caption=”Douglas Coleman”]A McMaster graduate is the recipient of the 2005 Gairdner Foundation International Award Recognizing Achievement in Medical Research for his contributions to the understanding of obesity. In particular, Douglas Coleman is known for the discovery of the adipose tissue hormone, leptin, an important component in the long-term regulation of body weight.

This week he is delivering the Gairdner lecture on his innovative studies that led to discovery of leptin and its role in obesity and diabetes. The session is being held Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 11 a.m. in the Michael DeGroote Centre for Learning and Discover, Lecture Hall 3020.

Coleman is senior staff scientist, emeritus, with The Jackson Laboratories, Bar Harbor, Maine, USA.

Coleman is one of six recipients of the 2005 Gairdner Foundation International Award. This year, the Foundation is recognizing outstanding achievements in medical research in the areas of obesity, human memory and gene splicing. Coleman's studies in mouse genetic models of obesity were the first to provide compelling evidence for the existence of a hormone system in obese and diabetic mice that participated in the control of fat cell homeostasis. These seminal findings provided breakthrough insights into the causes of obesity.

Coleman gradated from McMaster University with a BSc in Chemistry in 1954. He joined the Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbour, Maine in 1958, retiring in 1991.

Among Coleman's many awards are the Claude Bernard Medal (1977) presented by the European Diabetes Association in Geneva, Switzerland; the Distinguished Alumni Award in Science from McMaster University in 1999 and, in 1998, election to the prestigious National Academy of Science, one of the highest honours that can be accorded a U.S. scientist.

The Gairdner Foundation Awards, established by Toronto businessman James Gairdner in 1959, are considered one of the most prestigious honours in medical science. In the past 46 years there have been 274 award winners, 64 of whom have gone on to win the Nobel Prize.