NIH immunotherapy pioneer Steven Rosenberg awarded nation’s highest honor for technology and innovation

What

Immunotherapy pioneer Steven A. Rosenberg, M.D., Ph.D., has been awarded the National Medal of Technology and Innovation by President Biden. It is the nation's highest honor for technological achievement. Dr. Rosenberg is chief of the Surgery Branch at the Center for Cancer Research at the National Cancer Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health.

Awarded by the President of the United States, the National Medal of Technology and Innovation recognizes outstanding contributions to America’s economic, environmental, and social well-being. Dr. Rosenberg will receive his medal from President Biden at a White House ceremony on October 24, 2023. The distinguished oncologist is among nine individuals and a team of three receiving the award this year.

Dr. Rosenberg helped pioneer the development of immunotherapy, a form of treatment that helps a person's own immune system fight cancer. He identified the anti-cancer properties of a hormone, interleukin-2, that became the first cancer immunotherapy approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

He was the first to identify immune cells with cancer-fighting properties, called tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes, or TILs. He developed a form of treatment known as adoptive cell transfer (ACT) immunotherapy, in which TILs are extracted from a tumor, grown to large numbers in the lab, and then administered back to a patient as a “living drug” to shrink their tumors. ACT is now being developed by hundreds of academic and industrial centers to treat people with cancer.

Dr. Rosenberg was the first to introduce foreign genes into patients, a development that opened the field of human gene therapy, now being widely studied for many diseases. He was the first to use genetically engineered immune cells, known as CAR T cells, to treat patients with aggressive lymphomas.

In recent work, a clinical trial that Dr. Rosenberg is leading on the use of TILs to selectively target cancer cells led to complete and partial shrinkage of tumors in women with metastatic breast cancer. He is also using TILs to develop personalized cancer immunotherapies for patients whose cancers do not respond to standard treatments.

Who

Steven A. Rosenberg, M.D., Ph.D., Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute

About the National Cancer Institute (NCI): NCI leads the National Cancer Program and NIH’s efforts to dramatically reduce the prevalence of cancer and improve the lives of people with cancer. NCI supports a wide range of cancer research and training extramurally through grants and contracts. NCI’s intramural research program conducts innovative, transdisciplinary basic, translational, clinical, and epidemiological research on the causes of cancer, avenues for prevention, risk prediction, early detection, and treatment, including research at the NIH Clinical Center—the world’s largest research hospital. Learn more about the intramural research done in NCI’s Center for Cancer Research. For more information about cancer, please visit the NCI website at cancer.gov or call NCI’s contact center at 1-800-4-CANCER (1-800-422-6237).

About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit nih.gov.