A former student of the University of Dundee has been awarded one of the world's most prestigious cancer research prizes.
Dr Nick Lydon, who received his PhD in 1982 under the supervision of Dr David Stansfield in the Biochemistry Department at the University of Dundee is to receive the General Motors "Charles F. Kettering Prize" at a dinner at the Library of Congress Washington D.C. on June 5th.
The Prize is being presented in recognition of Dr Lydon's central role in the development of Gleevec, a drug that he developed at the Novartis Pharmaceutical Company in Switzerland and which has shown spectacular results in the treatment of a form of leukaemia called CML (Chronic Myelogenous Leukaemia). The drug is also showing impressive results for the treatment of some types of stomach cancers.
Dr Lydon will give a special lecture describing the discovery and development of Gleevec at the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation meeting on "New Directions in Cancer Treatment" to be held earlier in the day. Sir Philip Cohen, Director of the Wellcome Trust Biocentre at Dundee has also been invited to present a lecture at the same meeting and will attend the dinner at which Dr Lydon will receive a silver medal and share a cheque for 250,000 USD with Dr Brian Druker, the clinician who first showed the efficacy of Gleevec in CML.