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University of Chicago professor will be honored for contributing to advances in the understanding of genetic changes in cancer.

Janet Davison Rowley, M.D., the Blum-Riese Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine and of Molecular Genetics and Cell Biology at the University of Chicago Medical Center, has been named winner of the Villanova’s 2003 Mendel Medal. The Rev. Edmund J. Dobbin, O.S.A., University president will present Dr. Rowley with her award at the Mendel Medal 33rd presentation, which will take place on Saturday evening, March 29, in the Villanova Room in the Connelly Center The medal is named for Gregor Johann Mendel, O.S.A., an Augustinian priest who is recognized worldwide as the father of genetics.

Earlier on March 30, she will deliver a lecture on “Chromosome Translocations: Dangerous Liaisons. This lecture will begin at 2:30 p.m. in the Connelly Center Cinema; it is sponsored by Sigma XI, the Scientific Research Society, and by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Admission is free and open to the public.

Rowley is being honored for her significant contributions to advances in the understanding of genetic changes in cancer. She focused on chromosome abnormalities in human leukemia and lymphoma and in 1972, using new techniques of chromosome identification, she discovered the first consistent chromosome translocation in any human cancer. During her career she has identified more than a dozen different recurring translocations. These discoveries have revolutionized the view of hematologists/oncologists and cancer biologists regarding the critical importance of recurring chromosome abnormalities in cancer cells. Moreover, she showed that many different tumors were each associated with specific cytogenetic abnormalities that reflect critical genetics changes in the malignant cells of that tumor.

She has continued to open up new areas of research and make landmark contributions to cancer biology, diagnosis and treatment. Her rapid application of the recently developed technique of spectral karyotyping (1996) has resolved new chromosomal rearrangements associated with leukemias, opening up yet another series of discoveries. Her most recent foray is into the analysis of genome-wide gene expression in hematopoietic cells.

Rowley earned her bachelor of science (1946) and her medical degree (1948) and has spent her entire professional career at the University of Chicago. Throughout her career, she has received numerous awards, including the prestigious Lasker Award in 1998. She has been awarded seven honorary degrees including one from the University of Oxford, England, in 2000. Along with her friend Felix Mitelman, she founded and is coeditor of Genes, Chromosomes and Cancer, the premier cancer cytogenetic journal worldwide.

The Mendel Medal was established in 1928 by the board of trustees to recognize scientific accomplishment and religious conviction. The medal was first awarded in 1929 and given annually until 1943. Between 1946 and 1968, the medal was awarded eight times. Past recipients have included Nobel Laureates, outstanding medical researchers, pioneers in physical astrophysics and chemistry, and noted scientist-theologians.

In 1993, Villanova reestablished the Mendel Medal to confirm its original purpose of honoring the achievements and memory of Gregory Mendel as well as the work of an outstanding contemporary scientist.