2018 - Tony Hunter

Tony Hunter, PhD, FAACR

Professor Renato Dulbecco Chair, American Cancer Society Professor, The Salk Institute,La Jolla, California

Motivation:
Tony Hunter, PhD, is honored for his significant discovery of tyrosine kinases. This pioneering work has led to proven success in the usage of cancer chemotherapeutics that target disease-causing tyrosine kinases. Furthermore, Dr. Hunter is credited with being the first to demonstrate that dysregulated tyrosine phosphorylation by activated tyrosine kinases, such as the viral Src protein, can cause malignant transformation.
Dr. Hunter’s highly regarded work has led to the discovery and development of many effective drugs targeting aberrant kinase signaling in cancer cells.
Dr. Hunter received his BA and PhD from the University of Cambridge, England, and completed postdoctoral training at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and the University of Cambridge. Hunter is the Renato Dulbecco Chair in Cancer Research, and an American Cancer Society Professor in the Molecular and Cell Biology Laboratory at the Salk Institute.
Dr. Hunter has received many awards for his work on tyrosine phosphorylation, including a Gairdner International Award, the Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize, the Wolf Prize in Medicine, the Royal Medal of the Royal Society, and most recently the Sjöberg Prize for Cancer Research. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of London and the American Association for Cancer Research Academy, and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the European Molecular Biology Organization, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy Medicine, and the American Philosophical Society.

Dr. Hunter delivered his award lecture titled "Protein phosphorylation: Pancreatic cancer and new frontiers in histidine phosphorylation" at the AACR Annual Meeting 2018 in Chicago, Illinois. The award lecture was held Sunday, April 15, 2018, in the McCormick North/South Convention Center.

The award ceremony in Trento, was held at the Teatro Sociale on May 19, 2018, in the presence of political, religious and academic authorities, and numerous friends of the Pezcoller Foundation.