Patrick Allard receives 2015 Innovation in Regulatory Science Award

Patrick Allard, UCLA assistant professor of society and genetics as well as environmental health sciences, has received a 2015 Innovation in Regulatory Science Award from the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, an independent private foundation dedicated to advancing the biomedical sciences by supporting research and other scientific and educational activities.

These awards provide up to $500,000 over five years to academic investigators who are addressing research questions that will lead to innovation in regulatory science, with ultimate translation of those results into improving the regulatory process. The award recipients are developing new methodologies or innovative approaches in regulatory science that will ultimately inform the regulatory decisions the Food and Drug Administration and other agencies make.

Allard and his research team focus on the prevention of adverse health effects from environmental exposure. Faced with the tens of thousands of untested chemicals released in the environment, he and his research team are developing technologies that can rapidly and reliably determine whether these chemicals are safe. They concentrate on aspects of health that are particularly difficult to examine with current toxicity testing methods, such as reproduction, aging and heritable health effects spanning several generations. Allard's laboratory works closely with and receives funding from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the Environmental Protection Agency, as well as the Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing and others.

Allard also received the 2015 International ToxScholar Grant from the Society of Toxicology. He completed his training in reproductive biology, developmental biology and genetics from McGill University and Harvard Medical School.