Nobel Laureate Addresses Public Health Challenges Facing the Third World Lawrence University Convocation
APPLETON, WIS. -- Dr. Harold Varmus, whose ground-breaking research helped change the course of cancer research in America and earned him a Nobel Prize, shares his vision of a more active approach for tackling the public health challenges faced by the Third World Tuesday, April 30 in a Lawrence University convocation.
President and CEO of New York City's renowned Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, Varmus presents "Globalizing Science" at 11:10 a.m. in the Lawrence Memorial Chapel. A question-and-answer session will be held following his address. The event is free and open to the public.
Varmus, 62, began his medical career as a surgeon with the U.S. Public Health Service, but turned his attention to the genetic basis of cancer in 1970 when he joined the microbiology department at the University of California at San Francisco as a postdoctoral fellow. It was there he teamed with Dr. Michael Bishop and began conducting research on oncogenes -- normal genes that under certain conditions can turn renegade and cancerous.
Their research led to great strides in the understanding, diagnosis and treatment of a variety of cancers and the identification of more than 50 different oncogenes. In 1989, Varmus and Bishop were recognized for their ground-breaking work as co recipients of the Nobel Prize for Medicine.
In 1993, after spending more than 20 years at UCSF, Varmus became the first Nobel Laureate to be appointed director of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' National Institutes for Health in Bethesda, Md., the largest biomedical research organization in the world with 27 different institutes and centers and a budget of more than $20 billion.
Varmus spent six years as NIH's director before being named president and CEO in January, 2000 of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, the world's oldest and largest private institution devoted to the prevention, treatment and cure of cancer through patient care, research and education.In addition to the Nobel Prize, Varmus has been recognized with numerous honors, including the Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award, the Armand Hammer Cancer Prize, the Passano Foundation Award, the Alfred P. Sloan Prize from the General Motors Cancer Foundation and the Gairdner Foundation International Award.
A native of Oceanside on Long Island, N.Y., Varmus began his academic career as a student of Elizabethan poetry at Amherst College, graduating in 1961. He went on to earn a master's degree in English literature at Harvard University before pursuing a career in medicine, earning his medical degree in 1966 from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons.