Murray Brennan

Professor Sir Murray Brennan is a New Zealand-born surgeon, oncologist, cancer researcher, and academic, with over fifty years of experience in clinical practice.

He was Chair of the Department of Surgery at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center from 1985 to June 2006, and is currently Vice President of International Programs and Director of the Bobst International Center. He currently holds the Benno C Schmidt Chair in Clinical Oncology, and is Chairman Emeritus of the Department of Surgery. Prior to his career at Memorial Sloan Kettering, he was head of the surgical metabolism section at the National Cancer Institute.

Professor Brennan has lectured throughout the world and authored or co-authored more than 1,100 scientific papers and book chapters, and three books on soft tissue sarcoma. He has served as Director of the American Board of Surgery, Vice President of the American College of Surgeons, Chairman of the American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer, and President of the Society of Surgical Oncology, the James IVth Association, the Society of Clinical Surgery, the International Gastric Cancer Association, and the American Surgical Association.

He has been awarded Honorary Fellowships in the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, of England, and in Ireland, the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, and the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow and Canada. Professor Brennan has also received honorary doctorates from the Universities of Edinburgh, Otago, and Goteborg, and University College, London.

In 1995, Professor Brennan was honoured with membership in the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, and in 2000 he received the American College of Surgeons’ highest award, the Distinguished Service Award. In January 2015 he was appointed by Her Majesty The Queen as Knight Grand Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit.