The Louis Blecher Outstanding Lifetime Achievement AwardAmount of Award - TBD(click here to find out more.)
Louis Blecher Outstanding Lifetime Achievement Award
Amount of Award - $10,000
IPEC Foundation has established the Louis Blecher Outstanding Lifetime Achievement Award to reward those individuals who, during their lifetime, have made substantial intellectual contributions to the field of excipients, i.e., inactive pharmaceutical ingredients. Recipients of this award will be recognized by IPEC and may receive monetary compensation from the Foundation as a reward for their long dedication to understanding excipients.
Nominations for this award shall be submitted directly to the Board of Directors ("Board") of IPEC Foundation. The Board shall consider any nominations that was submitted to it and may consider any other nomination made by a member of the Board. An appropriate nominee is any individual who has conducted research or has been involved in improving the safety or effectiveness of excipients for a substantial period of time.
The Board will decide the winner of the award by majority vote of members of the Board after the Board has discussed the nominees. This award will be granted periodically, but not more than once a year, to those individuals that the Board decides have substantially contributed to the understanding of excipients through a lifetime of work.
At this time, this award is only eligible to residents of the United States. In the future, IPEC Foundation may expand the eligibility pool to residents of other countries. All applicants should complete the Foundation's Prize Application to be considered for this award.
The award for 2008 has been given to Louis Blecher, founder of the International Pharmaceutical Excipients Council of the Americas in 1991 and the person responsible for the creation of the Regional IPECs in America, Europe, and Japan. Mr. Blecher's strong commitment and efforts to build an excipient global trade association and to set high standards of global self-regulation and harmonization of excipients over the last seventeen years have been a credit to the entire international pharmaceutical industry. To honor Louis Blecher's outstanding lifetime efforts the Foundation has made him the first recipient of this award and renamed this award in his honor.
The Ralph Shangraw Memorial Award Amount of Award - $10,000(click here to find out more.)
Ralph Shangraw Memorial Award
Amount of
award - $10,000
The Ralph Shangraw Memorial Award is to be given to any person that has provided an outstanding research in the study of excipients or excipient-related technology.
Before his death in 1998, Professor Shangraw, former Chair, Department of Pharmaceutics, had spent over 38 years teaching and conducting research on improving the safety and functionality of excipients at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy, along with many years of service at the U. S. Pharmacopeia.
This award recognizes research achievements broadly in the field of pharmaceutical excipients, including but not limited to, research that contributes to: (1) an understanding of the basic science underlying excipient functionality, (2) excipient safety, including the development of test methods and standards, (3) the development of new excipients or novel use of existing excipients in new applications, and (4), the development of rational compendial/regulatory standards for excipients. Recipients of this award will receive $10,000 from the IPEC Foundation for their efforts.
Nominations for this award shall be submitted to the Foundation's Scientific Advisory Committee ("SAC"). The SAC will initially screen the applicants based on the Foundation's criteria, and the top (3) nominees will be referred to Foundation Board of Directors for final selection. The Board will decide the winner by a majority vote of the Board of Directors after discussing the various nominees and the recommendations of the SAC. The Board of Directors will rank the applicants by order of merit, to ensure a qualified recipient is readily available, in case the top-ranked selection declines the grant. All applicants must complete the Foundation's Prize Application to be considered for this award.
The award will be given out by the Foundation annually unless there are no worthy applicants that year. This award is open to any individual who has contributed to the research of excipients regardless of nationality. Employees of IPEC-Americas or IPEC Federation member companies are not eligible to receive monetary compensation if selected.
The Marshall Steinberg Memorial Award
Amount of Award - $10,000 (click here to find out more.)
Marshall Steinberg Memorial Award
Amount of award - $10,000
IPEC Foundation has established the Marshall Steinberg Memorial Award to reward those individuals who have made outstanding contributions in the area of safety and toxicology for excipients, i.e., inactive pharmaceutical ingredients. Recipients of this award will receive $10,000 from IPEC Foundation as a reward for their research.
Marshall Steinberg, Ph.D. (Toxicology and Pharmacology), former Chairman of IPEC, died in 2003. Marshall retired from a distinguished career in the U.S. Army in 1976 and, among other subsequent positions, was Vice President of Health and Environment at Hercules. He was President of the American College of Toxicology and a fellow of the Academy of Toxicological Sciences. Marshall directed creation of IPEC's Safety Guidelines which are held in high regard by Food and Drug Administration as a basis for testing new excipients.
Nominations for this award shall be submitted to the Foundation. The Foundation will then send these nominations to representatives of the American College of Toxicology ("ACT"). The Board will decide the winner after reviewing the recommendations from the ACT Awards Committee.
This award recognizes achievements in the field of pharmaceutical excipients that includes but is not limited to: (1) research that contributes to the safety of excipients; (2) investigations that establish test methods and standards that enhance the safety of excipients; (3) studies that support the development of new excipients or novel uses for existing excipients that provide or assure greater safety in their use in pharmaceuticals; and (4) toxicology research that improves the overall safety of excipients and/or finished pharmaceuticals.
The award will be given out by the Foundation annually unless there are no worthy applicants that year. This award is open to any individual who has contributed to the research of excipients safety and toxicology regardless of nationality. All applicants must complete the Foundation's Award Application to be considered for this award. Employees of IPEC-Americas or IPEC Federation member companies are not eligible to receive monetary compensation if selected.
Development of Strategic Excipient Initiatives Awards
IPEC Foundation has resolved to create a series of Strategic Initiative Awards to spur the development of research and new technology relating to excipients, i.e., inactive pharmaceutical ingredients. Each Strategic Initiative Award will target an issue that the Foundation has determined is the most important for furthering the safety or effectiveness of excipient products. These awards will focus on those areas where the private sector has shown to provide inadequate incentives for research and development. Each award will be accompanied by a financial reward given by the IPEC Foundation. The Foundation will both contribute its own money to establish the financial reward as well as solicit third parties to contribute to the financial reward. The rules for each Strategic Initiative Award will be determined on a case-by-case basis by the Foundation.
First Strategic Initiative Award
Amount of Award - $20,000
The Foundation has resolved that the first Strategic Initiative Award shall be given to the person or organization that develops the first low-cost portable test kit that can be used to test the quality of excipient products in the supply chain. IPEC Foundation has decided to give the winner of this award $20,000 from the Foundation's funds along with any other money that it can raise from third parties to support this award.
There is a large global concern over ensuring the quality of pharmaceutical products against the risks associated with bioterrorism and deliberate adulteration. In the past, some of the most egregious adverse events associated with pharmaceutical products have occurred due to the use of an incorrect inactive ingredients in products. For example, the inappropriate use of diethylene glycol as a solvent by the S. E. Massengill Company in their "Elixir Sulfanilamide" product in 1937 led to the deaths of over 100 people. In subsequent years this same adulteration was involved in two incidents in Haiti and one in Panama that led to many deaths. More recently it was the basis for a recall of toothpaste manufactured in China. Recently, the United States government has established the Interagency Working Group on Import Safety to specifically address problems associated with the importation of unsafe pharmaceuticals and to "improve the safety of imported products in a manner that expands global trade." The creation of a portable device that both governments and companies could use to test the excipients in imported products would be an extremely valuable innovation to ensure the safety and qualify of products for American consumers.
The winning device or devices should be able to be authenticate certain excipients on-site and be able to test the most widely-used excipients. Any technology that could be eligible to win the award must be available for purchase by any manufacturer and the U.S. Government.
Nominations for this award shall be submitted to the Scientific Advisory Committee ("SAC"). This Committee will review the nominations and make recommendations to the Foundation's Board of Directors who will then decide who shall win the award. The Board will decide the winner of the award by majority vote of members of the Board after discussing the various nominees and the recommendations of the SAC. This award is open to any individual, company or organization (governmental or private) regardless of nationality. All applicants should complete the Foundation's Award Application to be considered for this award.