Interferons at age 50: past, current and future impact on biomedicine

doi:doi:10.1038/nrd2422

Ernest C. Borden

Ernest C. Borden obtained his undergraduate degree from Harvard College, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, and his medical degree from Duke University, Durham, North Carolina. After appointments at the University of Wisconsin Comprehensive Cancer Center and then as Director of the Cancer Centers of the Medical College of Wisconsin and the University of Maryland, he joined Cleveland Clinic, Ohio, in 1998 to direct the Center for Cancer Drug Discovery and Development. In 2005, he was named Director of Center for Hematology and Oncology Molecular Therapeutics (CHOMT). He is also a staff member in the Departments of Solid Tumor Oncology and Cancer Biology and is a Professor of Molecular Medicine in Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine, Case Western Reserve University. In the 1980s, he was amongst the first doing clinical trials of interferons for cancer. In addition to developing improved approaches to clinically assess interferons and their inducers, Dr Borden's laboratory has focused on the function and action of genes that are stimulated by interferons and on the anti-tumour effects of other protein therapeutics. He has published over 200 articles and book chapters on interferons. Borden also has an international reputation for research and treatment of melanomas and sarcomas. He received the Milstein Award from the International Society of Interferon and Cytokine Research (ISICR) in 2004, and an American Cancer Society Distinguished Service Award in 1984. He also serves on the Scientific Advisory Boards of Cleveland BioLabs and Alios Bio Pharma.

Ganes C. Sen

Ganes C. Sen received his Ph.D. in biochemistry from McMaster University, Canada. During his postdoctoral training with Peter Lengyel at Yale University, USA, he began investigating the interferon (IFN) system. He has continued and expanded his activities in this area of research in his own laboratory, first at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, USA, and then at the Lerner Research Institute of The Cleveland Clinic, USA, where he nucleated the formation of a strong cytokine research group. He is currently the Interim Chair and professor of molecular genetics at The Cleveland Clinic and Vice-Chair of the Lerner Research Institute. Sen has published extensively on the mechanism of actions of IFN-induced proteins and the mode of induction and actions of double-stranded RNA-stimulated genes. For his contributions to IFN research, he received the Milstein Award in 2002. In another line of research, Sen studies the physiological roles of angiotensin-converting enzyme in blood pressure regulation, male fertility and kidney functions. Sen is a consultant for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the American Foundation for AIDS Research. Currently, he is a Senior Editor of the Journal of Virology and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Interferon and Cytokine Research.

Gilles Uze

Gilles Uzé (Email: uze@univ-montp2.fr) was trained in the laboratory of Ion Gresser (Villejuif, France) and received his Ph.D. in 1986 from the University of Paris VII. In 1993, he moved to Montpellier (France) where he is currently Research Director at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS). He has a long-term experience in the study of structure–function relationship of IFN and receptor components, and he has contributed to the understanding of the biological significance of the multiple type I IFN subtypes.

Robert H. Silverman

Robert H. Silverman holds the Mal and Lea Bank Chair in the Department of Cancer Biology at the Lerner Research Institute at the Cleveland Clinic. He is professor of biochemistry and molecular biology and microbiology at Case Western Reserve University, Ohio, USA, and professor of chemistry at Cleveland State University, Ohio. Silverman received his B.Sc. from Michigan State University, USA, and his Ph.D. in molecular, cellular and developmental biology from Iowa State University, USA. His postdoctoral training was at the Roche Institute for Molecular Biology, New Jersey, USA, and at the National Institute for Medical Research and Imperial Cancer Research Fund Laboratories, London, UK. He was professor in the Department of Pathology at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, USA, prior to joining the Cleveland Clinic in 1991. Among his honours and awards are the Milstein Award (1993), Harold L. Stewart Lecture in Experimental Oncology (2006), Sam and Maria Miller Scientific Achievement Award in Basic Research (2006), and the Standing Tall Tribute from the American Cancer Society (2007). He has published 180 papers, which are principally focused on the molecular mechanisms of IFN action against viruses and cancer cells.

Richard M. Ransohoff

Richard M. Ransohoff is Director of the Neuroinflammation Research Center in the Department of Neurosciences of the Lerner Research Institute, professor of molecular medicine at The Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine, and Staff Neurologist in the Mellen Center for Multiple Sclerosis Treatment and Research, both at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation. Ransohoff received several honours and awards, including The Cleveland Clinic Lerner Research Institute's Award for Excellence in Science in 2006. He has been cited from 1996 through to 2007 in the "Best Doctors in America" for his expertise in the clinical care of patients with multiple sclerosis. Ransohoff was elected to the American Association of Physicians in 2006. For the past decade, Ransohoff's research has focused on the functions of chemokines and chemokine receptors in the development and pathology of the nervous system. He also has a long-standing and continuing interest in the mechanisms of action of IFN- beta . Ransohoff has received research support from the NIH and the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. He has published more than 150 scientific reports, more than 50 reviews and book chapters, and three edited books.

Graham R. Foster

Graham R. Foster is the Professor of Hepatology at Queen Mary's School of Medicine, London, UK, and a consultant hepatologist at Barts and The London NHS Trust in East London. He trained in Medicine at Oxford and London Universities in the 1980s and completed a Ph.D. in molecular biology in 1992. Foster has a long-standing interest in the management of chronic viral hepatitis and runs a clinical research programme studying the natural history of viral hepatitis, its effect on patients and their communities, and novel therapies for this disease. He supervises a laboratory research programme investigating the mode of action of the different type I interferons. He is the sub-editor of The Journal of Viral Hepatitis and has published widely in the field of viral liver disease. He is a member of a number of patient advocacy groups and is a member of the UK Department of Health Advisory Group on Hepatitis.

George R. Stark

George R. Stark received his Ph.D. degree in chemistry from Columbia University in 1959. After a postdoctoral fellowship with William Stein and Stanford Moore at the Rockefeller University, USA, he joined the Department of Biochemistry at Stanford University, USA, in 1963, becoming professor in 1971. In 1983, he moved to the Imperial Cancer Research Fund in London, UK, as Associate Director of Research. In July 1992, he became the Chair of the Lerner Research Institute of The Cleveland Clinic Foundation, a position he held until August 2002. He is currently the distinguished scientist of The Cleveland Clinic Foundation, with a laboratory in the Department of Molecular Genetics, and a professor of genetics at Case Western Reserve University, USA. Stark was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1986, to the Fellowship of the Royal Society in 1990 and to the Institute of Medicine in 2002. He has also received the Sober, Milstein and Coley Awards. Stark's work with IFN, together with that of James Darnell, led to the discovery of the family of JAK–STAT (Janus kinase–signal transducers and activators of transcription) signalling pathways.