Three physician-scientists from the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins have been elected by their peers to the prestigious Fellows of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Academy class of 2022.

Otis Brawley, M.D., Suzanne Topalian, M.D., and Victor Velculescu, M.D., Ph.D., are being recognized by the AACR Academy for their scientific contributions that have made a significant and enduring impact on cancer research and progress against the disease. Nominated and elected through a rigorous peer-review process, they are among 33 inductees in the 2022 class of fellows of the AACR Academy, a global brain trust of top contributors to cancer science and medicine.

“With great pride, the entire Kimmel Cancer Center community congratulates our distinguished colleagues on this notable honor,” said William Nelson, M.D., Ph.D., Marion I. Knott Professor and Director of the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. “Their induction as fellows of the AACR Academy reflects the depth and breadth of their achievements in making progress against cancer and bringing those advances to benefit our fellow Marylanders and people around the world.”

Brawley is the Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Oncology and Epidemiology and associate director of Community Outreach and Engagement at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. He is known for his significant contributions to the fields of cancer prevention, early detection, diet and nutrition, cancer health disparities, tobacco cessation, and whole-patient care, and for his contributions to the promotion of appropriate screening efforts for malignancies such as breast, colon and prostate cancer. 

Topalian is a Bloomberg~Kimmel Professor of Cancer Immunotherapy at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and associate director of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg~Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. She is inducted for establishing groundbreaking and novel immunology-based treatment options for patients with multiple cancer types, conducting pivotal investigations involving the characterization of human anti-tumor immune responses, and developing predictive biomarkers and neoadjuvant applications for immune checkpoint blockade.

Velculescu is professor of oncology, pathology, medicine and genetic medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and co-director of cancer genetics and epigenetics at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. He is being honored for stellar contributions involving the discovery of genomic alterations in cancer cells and for developing noninvasive cancer detection technologies, including the first genome-wide sequence analysis in human cancer, Serial Analysis of Gene Expression (SAGE), and digital karyotyping, which have contributed to the identification of numerous cancer-related genes and pathways involved in tumorigenesis and individualized approaches for early cancer detection and diagnosis. 

The fellows of the AACR Academy class of 2022 will be recognized at the AACR Annual Meeting 2022, April 8-13.