John Mendelsohn
John Mendelsohn is Professor of Experimental Therapeutics in the Division of Cancer Medicine and is also Director of the Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Institute for Personalized Cancer Therapy, M.D. He is also Anderson/L.E. and Virginia Simmons Fellow in Health and Technology Policy, James A. Baker III Institute, Rice University. Mendelsohn is a major figure in illuminating and validating targeted treatment of cancer and the effectiveness of a new class of cancer therapy, monoclonal antibodies as the originator of anti-tyrosine kinase therapy, specifically, anti-EGF receptor therapy for cancer. Mendelsohn was the senior author of the earliest phase one clinical trial of an agent with these properties-monoclonal antibody 225, Erbitux. This drug is now FDA-approved for treatment of colon and H&N cancers. His series of studies with cultured and xenografted human cancer cells formed the experimental bedrock for development of receptor kinase inhibitors. Mendelsohn was the founding editor of Clinical Cancer Research and has written some 250 original publications, reviews, chapters, and books. Also served as founding director of the UCSD Cancer Center and chair of medicine at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center before coming to the MD Anderson Cancer Center, which under his inspired leadership has become the nation's top ranked cancer hospital and a leader in the world's most significant effort in personalized cancer medicine. Member, Institute of Medicine. Recipient, ASCO Karnofsky Award, the AACR Burchenal, Landon and Foti Awards, and the Dan David Prize, among others.