Jorge Torres, associate professor of biochemistry at UCLA, has won the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology’s Ruth Kirschstein Diversity in Science Award.

The award is given annually to honor an outstanding scientist who has shown a commitment to encouraging underrepresented minorities to enter the scientific enterprise and who has also provided mentorship.

Torres has served as a mentor for several diversity outreach programs at UCLA including the Amgen Scholars Program, the Historically Black Colleges and Universities Initiative and the Minority Access to Research Careers program.

Torres will give a talk about his work at the society’s annual meeting in 2019, which will be held in conjunction with the experimental biology conference in Orlando. He will also receive a $3,000 prize.