Larisa Cavallari, Pharm.D.

Professor of Pharmacotherapy and Translational Research

College of Pharmacy

2024 Awardee

Larisa Cavallari aims to establish effective precision medicine approaches to drug prescribing that improve outcomes across populations. As a professor of pharmacotherapy and translational research, she concentrates on the discovery of genetic associations with drug response, the translation of pharmacogenetic evidence into clinical practice and the examination of clinical pharmacogenetic implementation outcomes.

The Debbie DeSantis Term Professor at the University of Florida College of Pharmacy, Cavallari joined UF in 2014. She previously served as a tenured associate professor at the University of Illinois Chicago.

Cavallari has authored more than 200 peer-reviewed articles, including high-profile publications in The Lancet, the Journal of the American College of Cardiology and Nature Reviews Cardiology. As a principal investigator, she has secured more than $10 million in research funding from sources such as the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration and the American Heart Association.

In various roles, Cavallari has showcased her leadership within the university and on a national level. She serves as director of the UF Health Precision Medicine Program and co-director of the UF Center for Pharmacogenomics and Precision Medicine. For the past 18 months, she has also served as interim chair of the College of Pharmacy’s Department of Pharmacotherapy and Translational Research. Her professional service nationally and internationally includes leadership roles within the American College of Clinical Pharmacy and the Pharmacogenomics Global Research Network.

Cavallari is among a core group of faculty who have elevated UF to one of the preeminent institutions in the field of precision medicine. She is the past chair and a current principal investigator of the NIH-funded Implementing GeNomics In pracTicE, or IGNITE, Network that was created to enhance the use of genomic medicine in clinical care. In addition, she has contributed to writing multiple guidelines for the Clinical Pharmacogenetics Implementation Consortium, a panel of experts who provide guidelines on applying genotype information to prescribing decisions.

The UF Research Foundation Professorship is the second significant award Cavallari has secured this year. In March, she was honored with the American Society of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics Malle Jurima-Romet Mid-Career Leadership Award for her scientific achievements, leadership qualities and commitment to the profession.