Vikram Sharma from Andrew Wilkie's group was presented with the Young Investigator Award for Outstanding Science at the European Human Genetics Conference 2013 in Paris.
Title of talk: Mutations of TCF12, encoding a basic-helix-loop-helix partner of TWIST1, are a frequent cause of coronal craniosynostosis
Vikram said of the meeting, 'following the publication of my group's paper in Nature Genetics (Nat Genet. 2013 Sep 26;45(10):1261. doi: 10.1038/ng1013-1261a.), I presented the major findings from the story at the European Human Genetics Conference 2013 in Paris at an oral plenary session and won the coveted Young Investigator of the Year award for Outstanding Science. Only 4.6% of over 2000 abstracts submitted were selected for oral presentation, and in the words of the scientific chair, the ‘best of the best’ were selected for the 6 talks of the opening session (from which I was selected first to talk in front of over 3000 people!). There were 4 awards and 59 other researchers from around the world shortlisted, so it was a great honour to receive this prize, especially as I was the only person from the UK to win.'