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Judah Folkman
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Judah Folkman
Moses Judah Folkman (February 24, 1933 – January 14, 2008) was an American biologist and pediatric surgeon best known for his research on tumor angiogenesis, the process by which a tumor attracts blood vessels to nourish itself and sustain its existence. He founded the field of angiogenesis research, which has led to the discovery of a number of therapies based on inhibiting or stimulating neovascularization.
Born in 1933 in Cleveland, Ohio, Judah Folkman accompanied his father, a rabbi of Austrian-Jewish descent, on visits to hospital patients. By age seven, he knew he wanted to be a doctor rather than follow in his father's footsteps, so he could offer cures in addition to comfort. His father replied, "In that case, you can be a rabbi-like doctor," words his son took to heart.
Folkman graduated from Ohio State University in 1953, and then Harvard Medical School in 1957. While a student at Harvard Medical School, he trained under Robert Edward Gross and also worked on a prototype pacemaker, work that he never published.
In 1960, his residency was interrupted when he was drafted in the United States Navy and did research for the Navy until 1962 at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. During that time, he studied the use of silastic for the sustained release of lipophilic drugs; the 1964 publication of that work helped inspire the technological development of the Norplant implantable contraceptive at the Population Council.
The navy research was focused on developing artificial blood; in the course of testing potential products to see if they could keep alive thymus glands taken from rabbits, he noticed that tumors in the gland could not grow as they did if the glands were perfused with blood. His curiosity as to why led to his work on angiogenesis.
After his two years work for the navy, Folkman completed his residency at Massachusetts General Hospital. He worked as an assistant surgeon at Boston City Hospital, then trained further in pediatric surgery at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia under C. Everett Koop.
In 1967 he was appointed surgeon-in-chief of Children's Hospital Boston at the age of 34. Folkman was appointed the Julia Dyckman Andrus Professor of Pediatric Surgery at Harvard Medical School in 1968, where he was also Professor of Cell Biology. He was the youngest full Professor in the history of Harvard Medical School. In addition to directing the Children's Hospital Boston Surgical Research Laboratories, which grew to become the Vascular Biology Program, for nearly four decades, he was the Scientific Director of the hospital's Vascular Anomalies Center.
In 1971, he reported in the New England Journal of Medicine that solid tumors are angiogenesis-dependent. He hypothesized that there was an unknown "factor" that tumors secreted to help it increase its blood supply, and that if that factor could be blocked, tumors would wither and die. Though his hypothesis was initially disregarded and treated with skepticism by most experts in the field, Folkman persisted with his research. He and collaborators, who included Bert L. Vallee, soon identified the already-known fibroblast growth factor as an angiogenic factor, but the team's work showed that there were additional, unknown factors. To help accelerate the work, Folkman started collaborating with industry. In 1974 Harvard University and Monsanto signed a ten-year industrial-funded research grant to support his cancer research, which at that time was the largest such arrangement ever made; medical inventions arising from that research were the first for which Harvard allowed its faculty to submit a patent application. Robert Langer worked as a postdoc in Folkman's lab during this time, concentrating on using silastic and other materials to deliver drugs.
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Judah Folkman
Moses Judah Folkman (February 24, 1933 – January 14, 2008) was an American biologist and pediatric surgeon best known for his research on tumor angiogenesis, the process by which a tumor attracts blood vessels to nourish itself and sustain its existence. He founded the field of angiogenesis research, which has led to the discovery of a number of therapies based on inhibiting or stimulating neovascularization.
Born in 1933 in Cleveland, Ohio, Judah Folkman accompanied his father, a rabbi of Austrian-Jewish descent, on visits to hospital patients. By age seven, he knew he wanted to be a doctor rather than follow in his father's footsteps, so he could offer cures in addition to comfort. His father replied, "In that case, you can be a rabbi-like doctor," words his son took to heart.
Folkman graduated from Ohio State University in 1953, and then Harvard Medical School in 1957. While a student at Harvard Medical School, he trained under Robert Edward Gross and also worked on a prototype pacemaker, work that he never published.
In 1960, his residency was interrupted when he was drafted in the United States Navy and did research for the Navy until 1962 at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. During that time, he studied the use of silastic for the sustained release of lipophilic drugs; the 1964 publication of that work helped inspire the technological development of the Norplant implantable contraceptive at the Population Council.
The navy research was focused on developing artificial blood; in the course of testing potential products to see if they could keep alive thymus glands taken from rabbits, he noticed that tumors in the gland could not grow as they did if the glands were perfused with blood. His curiosity as to why led to his work on angiogenesis.
After his two years work for the navy, Folkman completed his residency at Massachusetts General Hospital. He worked as an assistant surgeon at Boston City Hospital, then trained further in pediatric surgery at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia under C. Everett Koop.
In 1967 he was appointed surgeon-in-chief of Children's Hospital Boston at the age of 34. Folkman was appointed the Julia Dyckman Andrus Professor of Pediatric Surgery at Harvard Medical School in 1968, where he was also Professor of Cell Biology. He was the youngest full Professor in the history of Harvard Medical School. In addition to directing the Children's Hospital Boston Surgical Research Laboratories, which grew to become the Vascular Biology Program, for nearly four decades, he was the Scientific Director of the hospital's Vascular Anomalies Center.
In 1971, he reported in the New England Journal of Medicine that solid tumors are angiogenesis-dependent. He hypothesized that there was an unknown "factor" that tumors secreted to help it increase its blood supply, and that if that factor could be blocked, tumors would wither and die. Though his hypothesis was initially disregarded and treated with skepticism by most experts in the field, Folkman persisted with his research. He and collaborators, who included Bert L. Vallee, soon identified the already-known fibroblast growth factor as an angiogenic factor, but the team's work showed that there were additional, unknown factors. To help accelerate the work, Folkman started collaborating with industry. In 1974 Harvard University and Monsanto signed a ten-year industrial-funded research grant to support his cancer research, which at that time was the largest such arrangement ever made; medical inventions arising from that research were the first for which Harvard allowed its faculty to submit a patent application. Robert Langer worked as a postdoc in Folkman's lab during this time, concentrating on using silastic and other materials to deliver drugs.