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Behind the news, there are always the newsmakers. Inspired by the high school yearbook tradition, we have rounded up a few such individuals worthy of notice in 2009. Some stepped into the spotlight eagerly, whereas others operated behind the scenes.
In June 2006, Warwick Anderson became chief executive of Australia’s National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) as the institution gained new status as a fully independent agency. He talked to Simon Grose about his first three years in the job and the NHMRC’s accelerated evolution.
This year witnessed both surprising successes and unexpected failures in basic and clinical drug development. There were also mixed results for some newly tested drugs, which will probably prompt a careful reassessment of their therapeutic value. Our drug watch compilation summarizes the most talked about therapies of the year.
The gold standard for early detection of prostate cancer, PSA, has recently come under fire for its high rate of false positives. Virginia Hughes investigates some of the researchers hunting for better alternatives and asks whether their promises of creating viable—and profitable—biomarker tests will ever be realized.