NIH Clinical Center's 2007 Medicine for the Public Leture Series

Cervical cancer is the second most common cause of death from cancer among women worldwide. Although detection by Pap smear has made a substantial impact on the incidence of this disease, FDA's approval of a new human papillomavirus vaccine (HPV) in June 2006 represents an enormous advance for public health. While most HPV infections do not lead to cancer, virtually all cervical cancer cases are caused by HPV infection, and two of the HPV types targeted by the vaccine cause about 70 percent of cervical cancer cases worldwide. This lecture will include an overview of cervical cancer prevention strategies, including use of the HPV vaccine and Pap smear.

Dr. Douglas R. Lowy is chief of the Laboratory of Cellular Oncology in the Center for Cancer Research at the National Cancer Institute. He is also a deputy director of the Center for Cancer Research.

His research includes papillomaviruses and the regulation of normal and neoplastic growth. In the 1980s, he studied the genetic organization of papillomaviruses and identified the three viral papillomavirus oncogenes. More recently, he has worked on papillomavirus vaccines and the papillomavirus life cycle with his long-time collaborator Dr. John Schiller, NCI. His laboratory was involved in the initial development, characterization, and clinical testing of virus-like particle based vaccines. His work examining ways to boost the body's immune response to prevent cancer-causing infection with the human papillomavirus led to the development of the technology on which the HPV vaccine is based.

Dr. Lowy received his medical degree from New York University School of Medicine in 1968, and trained in internal medicine at Stanford University and dermatology at Yale University. Between 1970 and 1973, he was a research associate in the Laboratory of Viral Diseases, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. He returned to NIH in 1975 to start his laboratory at NCI.

Together with Schiller, Lowy in 2007 was named the Federal Employee of the Year and received the American Medical Association Nathan Davis Award for outstanding government service, an NIH Director’s Award, and the Novartis Clinical Immunology Prize. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences Institute of Medicine.

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