Neurosurgeon and brain cancer researcher Eric Holland, MD, PhD, will be joining Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of Washington in summer 2013. Dr. Holland will be Senior Vice President and Director of the Human Biology Division at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, where his lab will be based.
Larry Corey, MD, President and Director of Fred Hutchinson said “I am confident that Eric will help us apply the strategies he has developed and used so successfully for brain tumors to many other types of solid-tumor cancers. His recruitment will catalyze numerous opportunities of this kind for our institutions,” he said.
With advances in genomics increasingly playing an important role in solid-tumor oncology, Dr. Holland’s expertise will provide strong leadership in this area.
Dr. Holland will oversee the recruitment of new laboratory-based investigators at Fred Hutchinson. At University of Washington Medicine, Dr. Holland will be a Professor of Neurological Surgery, hold the Chap and Eve Alvord and Elias Alvord Chair in Neuro-oncology and direct the Nancy and Buster Alvord Brain Tumor Center. The Alvord Center was established in 2009 to promote, develop and coordinate outstanding interdisciplinary brain tumor care and research among physicians and scientists in a variety of fields ranging from neurology to radiation oncology.
Dr. Holland said he is looking forward to the challenge of developing a world-class brain cancer and solid-tumor program in Seattle to build on the Hutchinson Center’s pioneering, Nobel Prize-winning work in bone-marrow transplantation to treat leukemia and other blood cancers and to collaborate with the outstanding genome scientists at UW Medicine.
“I am thrilled at the prospect of working with the world’s leading experts in genome sciences, computational biology, and those involved in the development of novel platforms for delivering innovative therapies to cancer patients,” Dr. Holland said. “The highly collaborative, multidisciplinary nature of cancer research at Fred Hutchinson and University of Washington Medicine provides a solid foundation to build on.”
Dr. Holland is currently the Emily Tow Jackson Chair in Oncology and the founding director of the Brain Tumor Center at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. ■
