Dennis Carson

Dr. Dennis Carson, Professor Emeritus of Medicine, UC San Diego, is an internationally recognized immunologist and cancer biologist, with the distinction of being one of the few living oncologists to formulate a cure for a disease. For Dr. Carson, this came in the form of the drug Leustatin, which cures the previously fatal Hairy Cell Leukemia. His interest in the treatment of non-proliferative disorders led him to Biological Dynamics, particularly the company's innovative approach for evaluating treatment response in blood cancers.

Dr. Carson is the author of more than 450 papers and has been a pioneer in key discoveries during his tenure at UC San Diego Medical Center, Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation, the NIH, and Salk Institute. At Scripps, he co-founded Vical, Inc., a biotech company that develops DNA vaccines. He is also a founder of several pharmaceutical, therapeutics and immunotherapeutic companies, including Triangle Pharmaceuticals, Dynavax Inc., Salmedix, Wintherix and TeLoRmedix. In 1990, he became Director of the UCSD Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging, followed by Director of UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center, where he had two drugs in development.

Carson was elected as a member of the National Academy of Sciences, National Institute of Medicine, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has received many prestigious honors, including the BIOCOM Life Sciences Heritage Award, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Chester Stock Award, and American Association for Cancer Research Bruce F. Cain Memorial Award. Dr. Carson received his MD from Columbia University and his BA in History from Haverford College.