Scott L. Friedman, MD, is founding Dean for Therapeutic Discovery and Chief of the Division of Liver Diseases at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine. He performed pioneering research that isolated and characterized the hepatic stellate cell, the key cell type responsible for scar production in liver. This achievement spawned an entire field that is now realizing its translational and therapeutic potential, with new anti-fibrotic therapies for liver disease reaching clinical trials. In this capacity Dr. Friedman interacts widely with the Biotech and Pharmaceutical industries in drug discovery and development, and clinical trial design. Dr. Friedman’s work has been continuously funded by the National Institutes of Health since 1985; he has held many national leadership positions including President of the American Assn for the Study of Liver Diseases, Senior Fulbright Fellow at the Weizmann Institute of Science and Senior Advisory Council for the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. He has published over 250 scientific articles, and is among the most preeminent scholars in his field worldwide.