In the Pat Burnell Young Investigator Award session that afternoon, the finalists who presented their posters to the audience were:
- Aurélie Marches, Malmö University, “3D Airway Models for In Vitro Studies and Drug Delivery”
- Shruti Sawant, Purdue University, “Development of Inhalable Phage-Encapsulated Liposomes for improved delivery against Pseudomonas aeruginosa Lung Infections”
- Joana Pinto da Silva, University of Algarve, “Locust Bean Gum Microcarriers for Lung Immunomodulation: In Vivo Efficacy Assessment”
- Lucia Vizzoni, University of Siena, “Inhaled Plasminogen for ARDS: from feasibility to in vivo efficacy and stabilize under simulate oxygen therapy administration”
- Anna Kelis, King’s College London, “The Development of an Inhalable Platelet-Based Therapy for Lung Injury”
Several of the finalists had prior experience presenting to similar audiences. Shruti Sawant was the winner of the 2021 VCU RDD Peter R. Byron Graduate Student Award for work on inhalable osimertinib liposomes for the treatment of lung cancer. Joana Pinto da Silva’s DDL 2025 poster was an update to her DDL 2023 talk on the use of spray-dried locust bean gum microparticles for delivery of bacterial lysates to the lung.
During the awards session held that afternoon, DDL committee members Jenny Lam and Regina Scherließ announced that Anna Kelis was the winner of the Pat Burnell competition. The awards session also included presentation of the poster awards, which were sponsored this year by the European Pharmaceutical Aerosol Group (EPAG).
The 2026 academic poster prize went to Anna Catton of the University of Bristol for her poster titled, “Physical Stability of Dry Powder Formulations Studied One Particle at a Time.” The industry poster prize was awarded to Irès van der Zwaan from AstraZeneca for her poster, “Development of an In Vivo Assay for Aggregation and Macrophage Uptake of Inhaled Biologics.”
Focus on Innovation
Gerhard Scheuch said during his DDL Lecture that the main lessons he wanted to impart were “be curious,” “be critical,” and “be brave and take your chance.” Those messages resonated with ideas addressed in a session titled, “Making Innovation Happen” on the second day of the meeting that specifically centered on entrepreneurship and translating ideas from academia to commercial businesses, a topic that will also be addressed by a new pitch day for OINDP research groups and start-ups called RespireX that will debut in March 2026.
