Congradulations Kevan Shokat and Jim Wells jointly received the Jacob and Louise Gabbay Award In Biotechnology and Medicine from Brandeis University.
The award is being presented for the pair’s groundbreaking work in cancer drug discovery, an effort that has led to new therapies for diseases once thought impossible to treat.
Wells, a professor in the Departments of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology at UCSF, has spent four decades developing new strategies for drug discovery in both biotech and academia. His work has led to multiple FDA-approved drugs, including pegvisomant, which treats a hormonal growth disorder; and bevacizumab (Avastin), which treats a variety of cancers. At UCSF, Wells also founded centers that currently engineer new antibodies — immune system proteins that can be designed to fight disease — and other proteins. Wells has also developed many widely used biochemical tools, including “tethering”, a clever method to identify hidden drug binding sites. This technology enabled Shokat’s discovery of KRAS inhibitors.