Harold Varmus Visits UCSF
Harold Varmus
Varmus, former director of the National Institutes of Health and co-recipient of a Nobel Prize for studies of the genetic basis of cancer, has served at the helm of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City since January 2000. Varmus, MD, will deliver a biomedical sciences seminar at 4 p.m. in Cole Hall, 513 Parnassus Avenue. His presentation, titled "Molecular Oncology Comes of Age," will be videoconferenced to:
Mission Bay, Genentech Hall, room S 261;
San Francisco General Hospital, building 1, room 150;
San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center, building 2, room 344;
Mount Zion, Cancer Research Building, Lurie Seminar Room. In 1970, Varmus joined the faculty at UCSF. Together with Mike Bishop, MD, they directed the research that led to the discovery of proto-oncogenes -- normal genes that can be converted to cancer genes by genetic damage. This work eventually led to the recognition that all cancer probably arises from damage to normal genes, and provided new strategies for the detection and treatment of cancer. Bishop and Varmus won many awards for this work, including the 1989 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine and the 1982 Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research. Varmus is also widely recognized for his studies of the replication cycles of retroviruses and hepatitis B viruses, the functions of genes implicated in cancer, and the development of mouse models for human cancer, which is the focus of much of his current work. Varmus' visit is sponsored by students in the Medical Scientist Training Program.