We are delighted to announce that Jesus College Emeritus Fellow Professor Richard Moxon FMedSci FRS has been awarded the prestigious Buchanan Medal by the Royal Society.

 

Richard is an internationally-renowned clinician and biomedical scientist, and founder of the University’s Oxford Vaccine Group, which, in collaboration with the Jenner Institute, is responsible for the UK’s ongoing COVID-19 vaccine response programme.  He is Emeritus Professor of Paediatrics in the University’s Department of Paediatrics. His research into the pathogenesis and prevention of bacterial meningitis led to the development of vaccines for the disease, thereby preventing serious illness and mortality – especially in young children.

The Buchanan Medal is awarded for distinguished contributions to the biomedical sciences. The award was created from a fund to the memory of the physician George Buchanan FRS (PDF), former Chief Medical Officer of the UK, and was first awarded in 1897. The medal is of silver gilt, is awarded annually and is accompanied by a gift of £2,000. The citation for Richard’s award reads:

Buchanan Medal – Professor Edward Richard Moxon FMedSci FRS, University of Oxford for helping pioneer the field of molecular microbiology; discovering contingency loci in bacteria that facilitate rapid evolution under selection and making key contributions to the development of meningitis vaccines. 

Richard said “I am deeply honoured and thrilled to receive the 2022 Buchanan Medal. I wish to recognise the dedicated contributions of the many medical scientists – in the laboratory and the clinic – with whom over many decades it has been my privilege and good fortune to carry out the research that led to this award.”

Richard, who was elected a Fellow of The Royal Society in 2007, is not the first Fellow of Jesus College to have received the Buchanan Medal. Honorary Fellow Sir Peter Ratcliffe FMedSci FRS was awarded the medal in 2017 for his ground-breaking research on oxygen sensing and signalling pathways mediating cellular responses to hypoxia.

Professor Sir Nigel Shadbolt FRS FREng FBCS, College Principal, said “On behalf of our whole community here at Jesus, I would like to congratulate Richard on his award of the Buchanan Medal. His pioneering research in molecular microbiology and immunology has transformed our understanding of how diseases such as meningitis and sepsis develop, and resulted in new vaccines that have changed and saved lives across the globe. Richard’s work establishing the Oxford Vaccine Group had also had an enormous beneficial impact for all of us. This recognition by the Royal Society is fantastic, and we look forward to celebrating with Richard in College very soon.”   

 

About Professor Richard Moxon

Professor Richard Moxon carried out his paediatric and research training in the UK (1966-1969) and the USA (1970-1974). He was Assistant and then Associate Professor of Paediatrics at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore (1974-1984), becoming the Eudowood Director of Paediatric Infectious Diseases in 1981 before he was elected as Action Research Professor and Chairman of Paediatrics at Oxford University (1984 – 2008) and Head of the Molecular Infectious Diseases Group in the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine (1988-2008). He is a Fellow of the UK Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health and of the UK Academy of Medical Sciences and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2007.

In 2021, Richard published a book  – BRAIN FEVER – HOW VACCINES PREVENT MENINGITIS AND OTHER KILLER DISEASES (World Scientific, 2021) – that traces the story of his involvement as one of the extraordinary and inspiring group of scientists who pioneered the development of vaccines to prevent bacterial meningitis, and argues that no other intervention in the history of medicine confers a greater public health benefit than immunisation. Read more here.