The winner of this year's pre-eminent research award in the Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences, Professor Michael (Mike) Dragunow, is committed to ensuring his research on the brain is contributing to patients, whānau and the global scientific community.

The Sir Peter Gluckman medal for 2022 has been awarded to Professor Dragunow in recognition of his drug discovery in the field of brain injuries and trauma and his sharing of findings with the scientific community and the people of Aotearoa New Zealand.

Professor Dragunow's research focuses on identifying the causes of, and developing treatments for, brain disorders such as epilepsy, stroke, Alzheimer's, motor neuron disease, Huntington's and Parkinson's, as well as brain injuries and cancers.

He established the Hugh Green Biobank, a facility developing world-leading methods to grow and study human brain cells and, most importantly, to directly test treatments on these cells. The Hugh Green Foundation has gifted an extraordinary $13.8 million to establish and run the biobank in perpetuity.

Professor Dragunow has supervised more than 80 graduate students, published more than 300 publications and has been very successful in attracting significant long-term grant funding.