2023 San Diego Genius Honoree
David Brenner | President/CEO Sanford Burnham Prebys
GENIUS NIGHT CHAIRS
Steve Hart | Martha Dennis
Mainly Mozart is proud to announce Dr. David Brenner as the 7th Annual San Diego Genius Award Honoree
Dr. David Brenner is the President and CEO of Sanford Burnham Prebys following more than 15 years as vice chancellor for Health Sciences at UC San Diego. Brenner is a leader in the field of fibrotic liver disease and liver cancer research and is widely respected for his work advancing laboratory discoveries to the clinic setting. Brenner is a former editor-in-chief of Gastroenterology, the premier journal in the field. Brenner has been instrumental in starting several multidisciplinary efforts in San Diego, including the Institute for Engineering in Medicine, the Institute for Genomic Medicine, the Sanford Consortium for Regenerative Medicine, the UC San Diego Sanford Clinical Stem Cell Program, and the C3 Cancer Center Consortium (comprising UC San Diego, the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and Sanford Burnham Prebys).
Brenner earned his M.D. from the Yale University School of Medicine. He was chief of Gastroenterology at the University of North Carolina and Chair of Medicine at Columbia University, before joining UC San Diego in 2007. His professional memberships include the National Academy of Medicine, the American Society for Clinical Investigation, the Association of American Physicians (of which he is a past president), and an NIH National Council. He has also served as a Pew Scholar and as a Clinical Investigator in the Veteran Affairs system.
History of San Diego Genius Honorees
Since 2015, Mainly Mozart has celebrated and recognized “Genius in the Spirit of Mozart” within San Diego through the San Diego Genius Award.
2022
Susan Tousi
Chief Commercial Officer of Illumina, National Academy of Engineering
2019
Pradeep Khosla
Eighth Chancellor of U.C. San Diego & Member of the National Academy of Engineering
2018
Elizabeth Blackburn
Awarded 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for Co-Discovering Telomerase
2017
Walter Munk
“Einstein of the Oceans” | National Medal of Science & Kyoto Award Winner
2016
Andrew Viterbi
Co-Founder of Qualcomm &
Inventor of the Viterbi Algorithm
2015
Irwin Jacobs
Co-Founder & Former Chairman of Qualcomm