2017 Schottenstein Prize Laureate

The 2017 Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein Prize in Cardiovascular Sciences has been awarded to Dr. Helen H. Hobbs of UT Southwestern Medical Center. Dr. Hobbs received her medical degree from Case Western Reserve University (Cleveland, OH) before completing an internship in internal medicine at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center (NYC, NY). She moved to Dallas, TX to finish her clinical training and being chief resident in internal medicine. After completing a post-doctoral fellowship in the laboratory of Drs. Joseph Goldstein and Michael Brown, she joined the UT Southwestern faculty.

Dr. Hobbs is currently a Professor of Internal Medicine and Molecular Genetics and since 2002 has been a Howard Hughes Investigator. In 1999, Dr. Hobbs started the Dallas Heart Study (DHS), a phenotypically well-characterized, multiethnic, population-based study in Dallas. Together with Jonathan Cohen, she performed studies in this cohort to show that rare and low frequency variants contribute to complex traits in the general population and can provide powerful tools to identify therapeutic targets. Dr. Hobbs showed that low frequency variants in PCSK9 not only lower plasma levels of LDL-cholesterol, but also protection from heart disease. Recently, two anti-PCSK9 antibodies were approved by the FDA for treatment of individuals with hypercholesterolemia. 

Dr. Hobbs was elected to the Institute of Medicine in 2004 and the National Academy of Sciences in 2007. She was awarded the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences in 2015 and the Passano Award (with Jonathan Cohen) in 2016.

Eligibility and Award Details

This prestigious prize provides national and international recognition to a physician or biomedical scientist who has made extraordinary and sustained leadership contributions to improving health care or who has successfully pursued innovative biomedical research with demonstrated translational benefits to patient care.

Those honored will be practitioners and/or scientists whose accomplishments and contributions have taken place over a career of dedicated and focused scientific discovery.

The prize is awarded biennially.

We are now accepting nominations for the 2019 Schottenstein Prize. Nominations are being accepted through January 31, 2019. Please click here to access the nomination form and requirements.

Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein

Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein are passionate about Ohio State. Their children – Joseph, Jeffrey and Jonathan – each have attended, or are attending The Ohio State University. Jeanie herself is a graduate.

The passion doesn’t stop there. Jay and Jeanie and Jay’s parents and siblings all have philanthropic ties to the university; the Jerome Schottenstein Center bears his late father's name. One might say the colors of scarlet and gray run deep in Jay’s and Jeanie’s veins.

It was natural, then, for them to pledge $2 million to The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center in 2008 to create the Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein Prize in Cardiovascular Science. The prize establishes an endowed fund to award up to $100,000 biennially to a physician or researcher who is an international leader in the field of cardiovascular sciences.

Because prizes of such magnitude are rare in scientific research and medicine, the Schottenstein Prize was expected to generate a lot of excitement.

"By providing this prize for cardiovascular sciences, we hope to further establish Ohio State as a leader in cardiovascular care and assure that it continues to set the bar for other institutions, nationally and internationally,” Jay said.

“This award will create a connection between Ohio State and some of the most outstanding cardiovascular scientists in the world,” added Jeanie. “Our goal in establishing this prize is to make a strong institution even stronger.”

According to Ohio State’s Heart and Vascular Center Director, Thomas Ryan, MD, this prize not only provides international recognition to someone who is on the leading edge of his or her field, but it will also offer an unparalleled educational opportunity for Ohio State’s academic, medical and research communities and the community at large. The awarding of this prize will expose these groups to the knowledge and discoveries of a physician or researcher of great talent and caliber.

“Our vision at Ohio State’s Heart and Vascular Center is to leverage advanced techniques and technologies to innovate and translate knowledge into personalized heart care,” explains Ryan. “The Schottenstein Prize offers another avenue through which to accomplish this.”

“The creation of the Schottenstein Prize addresses two important goals. First, it greatly enhances the reputation of OSU on the international stage as an institution where world-class science is recognized and valued. Second, it will expose our students, trainees, and faculty to the luminaries in modern cardiovascular medicine. I am both grateful and proud that we have been afforded this wonderful opportunity.”