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How Precision Medicine Will Transform Cancer Treatment

Nobelist Harold Varmus on the promise of a new generation of cancer treatments—and the big challenges that remain

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American



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LINDAU, Germany—Cancers, revered researcher Harold Varmus told me today, are like snowflakes, each one unique. But cancers also belong to families, and members of those families share vulnerabilities—genetic weak spots that scientists are learning to target with increasing precision. That makes this a very exciting time in the long slog against the second leading cause of death in the U.S.

Varmus is here in Lindau, Germany for this week’s 65th Lindau Nobel Laureates Meeting, an annual confab at which Nobelists give lectures and meet with young scientists from around the world. Varmus shared his Nobel in 1989 with J. Michael Bishop for their work on retroviral oncogenes. Since then, Varmus has held medical power positions including director of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, president of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, director of the U.S. National Cancer Institute, and most recently, a faculty member at Weill Cornell Medical College.

I sat down today to talk to Varmus about our deepening understanding of cancer and how diagnosis and treatment will change in the era of precision medicine. Below is an edited recording of our conversation:

Seth Fletcher is chief features editor at Scientific American. His book Einstein's Shadow (Ecco, 2018), on the Event Horizon Telescope and the quest to take the first picture of a black hole, was excerpted in the New York Times Magazine and named a New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice. His book Bottled Lightning (2011) was the first definitive account of the invention of the lithium-ion battery and the 21st century rebirth of the electric car. His writing has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the New York Times op-ed page, Popular Science, Fortune, Men's Journal, Outside and other publications. His television and radio appearances have included CBS's Face the Nation, NPR's Fresh Air, the BBC World Service, and NPR's Morning Edition, Science Friday, Marketplace and The Takeaway. He has a master's degree from the Missouri School of Journalism and bachelor's degrees in English and philosophy from the University of Missouri.

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