{"id":112448,"date":"2024-06-19T12:05:09","date_gmt":"2024-06-19T17:05:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/newsroom\/?p=112448"},"modified":"2024-07-23T14:31:41","modified_gmt":"2024-07-23T19:31:41","slug":"convocation-marks-beginning-of-great-adventure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/newsroom\/2024\/06\/19\/convocation-marks-beginning-of-great-adventure\/","title":{"rendered":"Convocation marks beginning of ‘great adventure’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

After the graduation celebrations end, what are you going to do?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

John Leonard, MD, president and CEO of Intellia Therapeutics, posed that question recently to degree candidates at UNMC\u2019s Graduate Studies Honors Convocation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is only the beginning,\u201d he told the soon-to-be graduates on May 3 while delivering the keynote address at the Omaha Conservatory of Music. \u201cWhat you choose to do doesn\u2019t have to be just a job or a succession of roles that culminate in a career. What you choose to do can also be a great adventure.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Leonard \u2013 recognized among the first TIME100 Health leaders<\/a> for his work on CRISPR-based technologies \u2013 is proof that careers can become more than one envisions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After graduating from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 1983, he said he planned to practice medicine. Then, after completing an internal medicine residency at Stanford University School of Medicine and a fellowship at the National Institutes of Health, he wanted to pose deeper disease questions of \u2018how\u2019 and \u2018why.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He realized \u201cseeds of opportunity\u201d toward a new career already had been planted \u2013 during microbiology discussions on recombinant DNA and hospital rounds in the early \u201980s when patients presented with AIDS before the disease had been identified. Dr. Leonard\u2019s career turned toward working with scientists and clinicians on the basic problems of disease and developing medicines that would impact more patients than he could ever see in a clinical career.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"
Liliana Bronner, PhD, was among those celebrating her special day at convocation.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Today, Dr. Leonard is among the leading research and development executives who have led breakthrough medicines through their discovery, development and launch into blockbuster drugs. While serving as global head of pharmaceutical R&D at Abbott Laboratories, he oversaw the development of numerous novel therapeutics. His groundbreaking work with HIV protease inhibitors Norvir\u00ae and Kaletra\u00ae led to new treatment paradigms for AIDS, his years of work with Humira\u00ae made it the all-time top-selling drug worldwide, and he led significant growth of the R&D pipeline at Abbott and Abbvie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou are only beginning,\u201d he told UNMC\u2019s degree candidates. \u201cOpen your minds to the possibilities that will come your <\/em>way. What you think you will be doing in the future can be different and far bigger than what you can imagine today, but you have to allow that to happen.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Leonard closed by saying:<\/p>\n\n\n\n