Phillip D. Zamore, Ph.D., the Gretchen Stone Cook Professor of Biomedical Sciences, Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, and Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, is Chair of the RNA Therapeutics Institute, which was established at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in 2009. Zamore received his A.B. and Ph.D. degrees in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Harvard University. He then pursued postdoctoral studies at MIT and the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research.

The Zamore laboratory studies small RNA silencing pathways in eukaryotes and prokaryotes, including the RNA interference (RNAi), microRNA, and PIWI-interacting RNA pathways. Zamore and his collaborators seek to use the fundamental insights gained from studies in model and non-model bacteria, insects, and mammals to design therapies for human diseases, including Huntington’s disease. 

In 2015, Zamore was awarded the Chancellor’s Medal for Excellence in Scholarship at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. To date, Zamore has more than 125 publications and has been among the most highly cited researchers for more than a decade. 

Zamore was elected a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors in 2014 and was selected in 2015 by Nature Biotechnology as one of the Top 20 Translational Researchers of 2014. In 2002, Zamore co-founded Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, a publicly traded biotech company which now has more than 200 employees and currently has more than six drugs in clinical trials. In 2014, he co-founded Voyager Therapeutics. He serves on the scientific advisory boards of Alnylam, Voyager, and RaNA Therapeutics.