PRESS RELEASES

Harris Search Associates recruits Dr. Joanne Turner as Chief Scientific Officer at the Abigail Wexner Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital

Following an extensive national search that included a highly competitive candidate pool from across the country, we are pleased to announce the recruitment of Dr. Joanne Turner as Chief Scientific Officer at the Abigail Wexner Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. Most recently, Dr. Turner served as Executive Vice President for Research and a Professor at the Texas Biomedical Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. Prior to that role, she was on the faculty at the Ohio State University for 14 years, rising to the rank of tenured professor in the Department of Microbial Infection and Immunity.

Dr. Turner’s research focuses on immunity to mycobacterial infection in relation to aging. She has been funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) continuously for 20 years, acquiring $12 million in grant funding during her career to date, and was the first woman at Ohio State to receive a prestigious research program project grant (P01) from the NIH. A prolific author with nearly 100 peer-reviewed publications, she is a reviewer for several journals and served as the associate editor for Pathogens & Immunity (2015-2022) and Aging Cell (2013-2018).

While at Ohio State, Dr. Turner was associate director of the Infectious Diseases Institute (2017); director for Women’s Academic Advancement, Center for Faculty Advancement, Mentoring, and Engagement (FAME) (2016-2017); chair, President and Provost’s Council on Women (2015-2016); and associate director of education for the Center for Microbial Interface Biology (2014-2017). She has served on numerous committees throughout her career, most recently on the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) leadership committee for UTHealth San Antonio.

Dr. Turner received her BSc in Immunology and Biochemistry at King’s College, University of London, and completed her PhD in Immunology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She then completed a post-doctoral fellowship in the Department of Microbiology at Colorado State University, where she also served as a research assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Pathology until her initial recruitment to Ohio State in 2003.

The AWRI at Nationwide Children’s is ranked among the top 10 freestanding children’s hospitals based on NIH funding, increasing by 50% over the past 5 years. On a continuing trajectory of rapid growth, the institute’s research expenditures – both internal and external – have grown from roughly $100 million to over $200 million over the last decade. Research conducted by more than 200 principal investigators and over 100 postdoctoral fellows and graduate students has resulted in more than 1,500 publications per year, and the launching of 16 startup companies.

With a new research building opening in 2023, AWRI will encompass more than 850,000 square feet of dedicated pediatric research space across four buildings on the Nationwide Children’s campus. Centralized, on-site resources support center investigators at all stages of their work. Core facilities to support research include Animal Resources (vivarium), Biobehavioral Outcomes, Biopathology and Biobanking, Biostatistics, Clinical Research Services, Gene Editing, Cell and Tissue cGMP manufacturing, Flow Cytometry, Immune Monitoring, Genomic Sequencing, and Computational Services, and Histopathology. Researchers also have access to core resources at The Ohio State University Center for Clinical and Translational Science. In-house research regulatory affairs staff, an experienced and comprehensive clinical trials infrastructure, and a robust Office of Technology Commercialization ensure that discoveries in the lab are well-resourced for translation into novel diagnostics and therapeutics that can be brought to the clinic and ultimately commercialized into new paradigm-shifting treatments for children. AWRI additionally has an outstanding Office of Sponsored Projects that assists faculty with grant submissions and managing grants and other finances.

Founded in 1892, Nationwide Children’s Hospital has steadily evolved into one of the leading children’s hospitals in the nation. Named as a Top 10 Honor Roll “Best Children’s Hospital” for the past eight years, Nationwide Children’s is one of America’s largest not-for-profit freestanding pediatric health care systems providing wellness, preventive, diagnostic, treatment, and rehabilitative care for infants, children, and adolescents, as well as adult patients with congenital disease. In partnership with the Department of Pediatrics and the Department of Surgery at The Ohio State University College of Medicine, Nationwide Children’s trains the next generation of pediatricians, pediatric surgeons, pediatric specialists, and research scientists.