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Recognition for the Ennoblement of the Human Sprit in Academics, The Arts, and Human Welfare

2016 Laureates

Larry W. Kwak Professor, City of Hope National Medical Center

Introduction Video

  • Medicine
  • Larry W. Kwak
    Professor, City of Hope National Medical Center
  • Education & Work Experience
    1959 Born in Rochester, NY, USA 1979 B.S., Medical Science, Northwestern University, USA 1982 M.D., Northwestern University Medical School, USA 1984 Ph.D., Tumor Cell Biology,Northwestern University Graduate School, USA 1984~1992 Internship/Residency/Fellowship, Stanford University, USA 1992~2004 Investigator, NCI, NIH, USA 2004~2015 Professor and Chairman, Department of Lymphoma and Myeloma, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, USA 2015~ Friedman Endowed Professor, City of Hope National Medical Center, USA

Achievements

Dr. Larry W. Kwak, an insightful physician-scientist, has been pioneering the cancer immunology field, leading to the current dramatic successes of cancer immunotherapy in the clinic. Dr. Kwak is responsible for some of the earliest fundamental findings contributing to cancer vaccine development. His controlled clinical trial of the lymphoma vaccine, which originated in his laboratory, is a hallmark in the field and the first positive Phase III trial showing cancer vaccines can work in a blood cancer. He single-handedly, patiently developed this agent from bench-to-bedside by developing serial testable hypotheses, challenging existing paradigms. His TIME100 award for his 20-year commitment to the science of cancer vaccines underscores the excitement in this field. Specifically, his main achievement is to have for the first time demonstrated that the surface antigen receptor on malignant B cells, which had been thought to be antigenic targets only for antibody recognition, can serve as a molecular and antigenic target for T cells in human B-cell lymphoma in 1992. This study provided the framework for the subsequent personalized lymphoma vaccine clinical trial described above.

He has also contributed to the advancement of cancer vaccine therapy by inventing multiple platform technologies such as a genetic vaccine delivery. As another noteworthy achievement, he identified macrophage inflammatory protein-3(MIP3A) as an integral component of immunotherapy platforms in hematologic malignancies in 1999. This discovery has paved the way for designing cancer vaccines combined with MIP3A. Just last year, he launched an original first-in-human clinical trial of this next generation cancer vaccine, which will be the basis for vaccines applied to many different types of cancer, as well as against AIDS.

Lastly, his team discovered the development of depleting peptides against myeloid derived suppressor cells, a rare but potent cell type that suppresses the immune response to cancer, that could help release the brakes on the anti-cancer immune response in 2014. In summary, his seminal works spanning the last two decades have been providing conceptual frameworks for the design of cancer immunotherapies.

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