Winners were honored Mar. 25 at the Maryland Bioscience Awards ceremony, conducted by the Greater Baltimore Committee (GBC) at the Renaissance Harborplace Hotel in Baltimore. The GBC has made bioscience industry development a top strategic priority. This is the fifth annual bioscience awards event the GBC has conducted.

"We instituted these awards to highlight the growth, development, and high achievement of Maryland's bioscience industry," said GBC President and CEO Donald C. Fry. "Despite a difficult year for bioscience companies, the year was also marked by advances in the industry and great successes. We're here today to celebrate those successes."

Winners of the 2010 Maryland Bioscience Awards included:

• Leadership in Bioscience: Claire M. Fraser-Liggett, PhD, director, Institute for Genome Sciences, University of Maryland School of Medicine. Under Dr. Liggett's leadership, the Institute for Genome Sciences, a part of the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore, has grown to a 95-person interdisciplinary team of investigators. Housed at the UM BioPark, the institute has become a leading center for major biological initiatives of international value, including the Human Microbiome Project and the Genomic Sequencing Center for Infectious Diseases.
• Best New Product or Progress: Wayne Swann, senior advisor, CrispTek, LLC. CrispTek, LLC, located in Columbia, Md., produces and sells ChoiceBatter, a formulated food coating consisting of rice-based flours, pre-gels, and modified rice starches invented by USDA Agricultural Research Scientists in New Orleans.
• Entrepreneurial Spirit: Charlene Riikonen, president and CEO, Cera Products, Inc. Cera Products, Inc. was founded in 1993 by Charlene Riikonen, who was later joined by Johns Hopkins University physicians David Sack and W. B. Greenough.
• President's Award: Dr. Martha Connolly, director, Maryland Industrial Partnerships. Dr. Connolly spearheaded development of the new Maryland Drug Discovery and Development Network in Maryland. This effort has helped collate the vast bioscience resources in the University of Maryland System, Johns Hopkins and a number of Maryland's community colleges.

Winners of the 2010 Maryland Bioscience Awards were selected by a panel of judges from more than 30 nominees submitted by businesses, bioscience advocates, higher education institutions and government agencies.

Judges for this year's awards were: Dr. David J. Fink, director of entrepreneurial services, bwtech@UMBC; Dr. Libbie Mansell, president, White Oak BioPharma Solutions, LLC; Karen Olson, CEO, BioMarker Strategies; Howard Schwartz, Esq, partner, DLA Piper; and Dr. Paul Silber, principal, Silber Associates.