2008 Researcher Category
(awarded posthumously)

Dr. Maurice Hilleman (1919-2005) was widely regarding as the world's foremost vaccine developer. During his long career, which was largely spent at Merck, he pioneered the development of numerous live, killed and combined vaccines that now help protect against important diseases caused by viruses, including measles, mumps, rubella, varicella, influenza, Marek's disease, hepatitis A, hepatitis B and adenovirus. He also played a significant role in the commercial evolution of vaccines against bacterial infections cause by meningococi and pneumococci. In addition to his work in vaccine development, he is credited with having first described antigenic drift and shift, which account for the evolution of influenza viruses, and for purifying interferon, leading to his seminal work describing its biological and chemical properties.

Among his many awards, he was the recipient of the Albert Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research, the Albert B. Sabin Lifetime Achievement Award, a Special Lifetime Achievement Award by the WHO, and the National Medal of Science (the nation's highest scientific honor). He was an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, and the American Philosophical Society.