William Kaelin Jr., MD

Sidney Farber Professor of Medicine, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Harvard Medical School; Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute

Dr. William Kaelin earned bachelor’s degrees in Chemistry and Mathematics from Duke University before completing his MD there. He trained in internal medicine at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and pursued a fellowship in medical oncology at Dana‑Farber Cancer Institute (DFCI). As a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of David Livingston, MD, he began studying tumor suppressor proteins, which would become the foundation of his scientific career. He joined DFCI’s faculty in 1992, became a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator in 1998, and was appointed a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School in 2002.

Dr. Kaelin’s research focuses on tumor suppressor genes and the cellular pathways they control. His most influential work centers on the von Hippel–Lindau (VHL) tumor suppressor protein. By uncovering how VHL regulates the stability of hypoxia‑inducible factors (HIFs), he revealed the molecular machinery that allows cells to sense and respond to oxygen levels. This discovery reshaped the understanding of cancer metabolism and oxygen biology. It motivated the successful testing of VEGF‑inhibiting drugs for the treatment of kidney cancer and the development of a recently approved HIF inhibitor for kidney cancer and other cancers. It also paved the way for HIF‑targeting therapies for anemia. His laboratory additionally discovered why thalidomide-like drugs are so effective against multiple myeloma, leading to a new class of drugs called “molecular glue degraders.” He continues to investigate how mutations in cancer-relevant genes—including the VHL, IDH1/2, and RB genes—can be leveraged to design treatments that selectively kill cancer cells while sparing healthy tissue.

For his transformative discoveries, Dr. Kaelin has received many of the most prestigious honors in biomedical science. He was awarded the Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award, recognizing fundamental insights that have advanced human health. In 2019, he shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for elucidating how cells sense and adapt to oxygen availability—a breakthrough that has opened new therapeutic frontiers and reshaped modern cancer biology.