Award for Innovation in Healthcare & Bioscience

Recognizing achievements in transformative approach to infectious disease research and business.

Bringing to bear his competitive spirit, teamwork and willingness to take risks, Schlesinger launched a 10-year strategic plan and put Texas Biomedical Research Institute (Texas Biomed) on a path to more than double its annual revenue in less than 10 years, creating jobs and impact in what is already the city’s largest economic sector – healthcare and bioscience – the bedrock of San Antonio’s economy. Texas Biomed now employs almost 500 people in San Antonio, a nearly 40% growth since 2017, and according to a 2018 economic impact report of the Institute’s strategic plan, the Institute is expected to produce a $3.2 billion economic impact in Bexar County by 2028.

Unforeseen but not unexpected, Schlesinger’s strategy, which began in 2018, positioned Texas Biomed to become a global partner in the race to develop vaccines and therapeutics and help the City of San Antonio navigate the COVID-19 pandemic. While no one predicted the global impact of COVID-19, Schlesinger foresaw the need for a new approach to science funding and partnership that enabled the speed and efficacy of the COVID-19 response. Texas Biomed’s business model is now a nearly 50/50 split between federally funded basic
research and translational contract-type research with the goal of those studies to move diagnostics, therapies and vaccines toward FDA approval.

While Schlesinger’s leadership role enables him to expedite patient interventions, his heart remains in the lab. A renowned physician scientist, his lab focuses on tuberculosis (TB) and other airborne infectious agents that subvert lung immunity. He has been funded by the NIH for more than 30 years, authored 250+ peer-reviewed articles, reviews and books, served on NIH study sections and committees, and is a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology. Despite TB being preventable and curable, it is still the leading cause of infectious disease deaths, killing nearly 1.5 million people annually. Schlesinger’s work in the field since the 1990s has led to multiple discoveries, critically around how our immune cells recognize and respond to Mycobacterium tuberculosis(M.tb), the bacteria that causes TB. These studies helped scientists identify new targets for interventions and treatments to better control or eliminate TB.

Dr. Schlesinger earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Cornell University and his medical degree from Rutgers Medical School. He completed his residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Michigan and clinical and research fellowships in Infectious Diseases at University of California, Los Angeles. Prior to joining Texas Biomed, he held several posts at The Ohio State University, including Director of the Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Internal Medicine; First Chair of the Department of Microbial Infection & Immunity; and Founder and Director of the university-wide Center for Microbial Interface Biology (now called the Infectious Diseases Research Institute).