Profile of Charles L. Sawyers

Abstract

Charles Sawyers is a rock star in his own right. Last year, Sawyers, chair of the Human Oncology and Pathogenesis Program at Memorial Sloan–Kettering Cancer Center and a member of the National Academy of Sciences, posed with singer Debbie Harry of the rock band Blondie to promote cancer research in a campaign sponsored by the Geoffrey Beene Cancer Research Center. The unlikely assemblage of rock star and researcher shined the spotlight on pioneering efforts in translational cancer research. Few physicians deserve that spotlight more than Sawyers, who co-discovered the targeted cancer drug, Gleevec, forging a path to cancer treatment that has now become increasingly common. Charles L. Sawyers. Born to physicians who served as a source of inspiration, Sawyers grew up in a Nashville, Tennessee household where medicine was the order of the day. A standout in school, Sawyers excelled in science and mathematics. However, he headed toward college without the conviction that his professional path was predestined. “Although I was heavily exposed to medicine through my parents, my uncles, and my grandfather—all physicians, I never felt like I was part of a lineage,” he says. So, when it came time to choose a field of study at college, Sawyers decided that the humanities could help widen his worldview. He majored in history at Princeton University, focusing on the history of science. At Princeton, Sawyers’ interest in the scientific method was sparked by the writings of legendary science historian Thomas Kuhn, whose storied opus, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, has inspired generations of researchers pursuing science. Sawyers’ scientific temperament took shape when, in 1981, he enrolled in the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. There, Sawyers attended lectures in molecular biology with the eagerness of a budding physician intrigued by basic science. “When I learned that the clinical presentation of some diseases could be narrowed down to single-nucleotide mutations, I was awestruck,” he says. Awe gave way to passion as Sawyers pored over volumes of basic biology literature, soon surpassing peers who had undergraduate degrees in science. Toward the end of medical school, his cousin, a physician, recommended Sawyers move across the country to complete his medical residency at the University of California in San Francisco (USCF).