2005 Presenter Full Presenter List

Josef Penninger

Gene Specialist

Penninger is a superstar in the world of science. A medical researcher who discovered the master gene for osteoporosis, Penninger has been named to Canada’s Top 40 Under 40 and Esquire’s List of 10 Extraordinary Lives.

Born and raised in Gurten, Austria, Penninger moved to Toronto in 1990 for his postdoctoral studies, under the leadership of immunologist Tak Mak. His Amgen Institute and Ontario Cancer Institute lab were ranked among the top 10 labs in the world in all fields of science for three straight years.

Since his last appearance on the ideaCity stage, Josef Penninger has gone back to his native Austria, to become the Scientific and Administrative Director of the Institute of Molecular and Cellular Bioinformatics at the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna. In 2003, Penninger and his team identified the gene that regulates male specific fertility that is required for chromosomes in sperm cells to find their right partners.

An Adjunct Professor for the Departments of Immunology and Medical Biophysics at the University of Toronto, Penninger is Professor of Genetics at the University of Vienna, Austria. In 2004, Penninger received the Austria04 Award: Austrian of the Year (in science; given by Die Presse Newspaper), as well as appointed a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.