October 21, 2010
Dr. Pinto was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka and received his B.Sc. degree in Chemistry and PhD from Queen’s University. Dr. Pinto served as Chair of the Chemistry Department from 1999 to 2004, and is currently Vice-President, Research at Simon Fraser University. Dr. Pinto received the 1992 Horace S. Isbell Award of the American Chemical Society, the 1993 Merck Frosst Award of the Canadian Society for Chemistry (CSC), the 2002 Bernard Belleau Award of the CSC, and the 2005 British Columbia Innovation Council Frontiers in Research Award. He is a Fellow of the Chemical Institute of Canada, and was elected to the Academy of Sciences of the Royal Society of Canada in 2003.
Dr. Pinto is a pioneer in the field of chemical biology, having developed novel NMR/molecular modeling protocols for protein structure determination and the study of ligand topographies essential for drug and vaccine design. His work also involves the synthesis of antiviral and antibacterial drugs, bacterial vaccines, and new methods of viral control. Dr. Pinto was recently awarded a patent for his breakthrough on the effect of glycosidase inhibitors as novel therapeutic agents for Type 2 diabetes, which has proven effective in lowering blood glucose levels in rats. He founded the company, Mimos Therapeutics, Inc. and is one of the founding members of the Centre for Drug Research and Development (CDRD).