Judah Folkman - Scientific Legacy

Scientific Legacy

Folkman was appointed the Julia Dyckman Andrus Professor of Pediatric Surgery at Harvard Medical School in 1968, where he was also Professor of Cell Biology. He was the youngest full Professor at Harvard Medical School in history. In addition to directing the Children's Hospital Boston Surgical Research Laboratories, which grew to become the Vascular Biology Program, for nearly four decades, he was the Scientific Director of the hospital's Vascular Anomalies Center. A revered figure at the hospital and throughout the world, Folkman's insights informed many active research efforts outside the field of vascular biology. He constantly initiated new collaborations to study a number of varied disorders, including hydrocephalus and hemorrhages in the brains and eyes of premature infants. His presentations consistently drew standing-room-only audiences.

Folkman was a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, the National Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society, among others. He was the author of some 400 papers and more than 100 book chapters and monographs and received scores of United States awards and honors for his research as well as numerous international awards, including Canada's Gairdner Foundation International Award, Israel's Wolf Foundation Prize in Medicine, Germany's Ernst Schering Prize, the Italian Association of Cancer Research in Rome's Gold Medal, the United Kingdom Society for Endocrinology's Dale Medal,Prince of Austurius Award and Switzerland's Dr. Josef Steiner Cancer Research Award. In 2006, Folkman was one of seven people appointed by President Bush to the National Cancer Advisory Board of the National Institutes of Health.

Folkman's scientific accomplishments included founding a new field of biology and devising a novel approach to understanding and treating many diseases, including cancer. He mentored an entire generation of world-class scientists and clinicians throughout the world. This accomplishment, along with his generous collaborative spirit, has resulted in the continued study of angiogenesis in hundreds of laboratories worldwide.