Inside Duke Medicine

Lyerly named chair of national cancer panel

H. Kim Lyerly, M.D., director of the Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center, has been named chair of the Cancer Centers Standing Subcommittee of the National Cancer Advisory Board (NCAB).

Lyerly was appointed by President George W. Bush to the NCAB in June 2008.

The National Cancer Advisory Board is an advisory committee of the U.S. National Cancer Institute (NCI). The board consists of 18 members appointed by the president and selected from the leading representatives of the health and scientific disciplines. Lyerly was one of eight new appointees named in July.

The purpose of the Cancer Centers Subcommittee is to work with staff of the NCI to examine issues and policies related to the Cancer Centers Program. The Cancer Centers Program supports 64 NCI-designated cancer centers nationwide that are actively engaged in transdisciplinary research to reduce cancer incidence, morbidity, and mortality.

The subcommittee makes recommendations for acceptance and/or modification by the NCAB which in their final form are advisory to the director of the NCI. At the discretion of the director of NCI, the subcommittee or representatives of the subcommittee can be asked to provide leadership in the examination of special problem areas that may have a major impact on the policies and objectives of the Cancer Centers Program.

“I am honored to be chosen by President Bush to serve on this important cancer advisory board and to chair this important subcommittee,” said Lyerly. “I view this as a wonderful opportunity as well as a huge responsibility. In this role, I want to be a voice for cancer patients, cancer researchers and physicians as we strive to shape policies that will positively affect each of these groups and bring increased attention to their needs.”

Lyerly is the George Barth Geller Professor of Cancer Research. He is currently the principal investigator of the Cancer Center Core Grant, the Duke Specialized Program in Research Excellence (SPORE) grant in breast cancer, and a program project grant directed toward developing antigen specific immunity in patients with cancer.

Lyerly is an internationally recognized expert in cancer therapy and cancer immunotherapy and has published over 150 scientific articles and has edited 10 textbooks on surgery, cancer immunotherapy and novel cancer therapies. He serves on the editorial board of 12 scientific journals.

As director of the Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center, Lyerly has led the development of the Duke Translational Research Oncology program, which is designed to enhance efforts in experimental therapeutics and translational medicine. In addition, he has established a partnership with Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences to foster research collaborations which seek to explore the connection between cancer and the environment.

Lyerly is well known for his innovation in bringing basic science concepts into clinical testing and was part of the team of investigators who first reported the use of azidothymidine (AZT) for the treatment of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection. He developed strategies targeting virally associated tumors with viral-specific immune cells, and was the first to show this approach to be effective in eradicating tumors in mice, a technique that is now in clinical practice.

He was a pioneer in the clinical testing of gene therapies for breast cancer, colon cancer, lung cancer and pancreatic cancer. Lyerly was one of the first investigators to explore the clinical utility of dendritic cell based vaccines for the treatment of cancer. He was the first investigator to use RNA modified cells as a therapeutic vaccine, receiving approval from the Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee of the National Institutes of Health and the Federal Food and Drug Administration in February 1997.

Lyerly is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of Susan G. Komen for the Cure and the Burroughs Wellcome Foundation. He has previously served as chair of the executive committee of the integration panel of the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs in Breast Cancer. He also serves on American Society of Clinical Oncology’s (ASCO) Grants Selection Committee, of which he served as chair in 2006.

Lyerly is a member of the American College of Surgeons, of which he is a fellow. Lyerly has been named consistently by his peers as one of North Carolina’s most outstanding clinical physicians. In 2007, he was invited by North Carolina Gov. Michael Easley to serve on the Advisory Commission of the state Museum of Natural Sciences.