 He is the 13th recipient of this recognition, awarded annually by the Sabin Vaccine Institute.Called the father of human gastroenteritis virus research, Kapikian identified the first norovirus, initially called Norwalk virus, in 1972; and he and his colleagues at the National Institutes of Health identified the hepatitis A virus in 1973.Kapikian graduated from Cornell Medical College in 1956 and began a career with the National Institutes of Health in 1957.