John E. Niederhuber, M.D.

John E. Niederhuber, M.D., is Deputy Director, National Cancer Institute (NCI) and Deputy Director for Translational and Clinical Sciences, NCI, National Institutes of Health. He assumed this position in October 2005. He was formerly the Wattawa Professor-Bascom in Cancer Research, Professor of Surgery and Oncology at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine. Dr. Niederhuber served the University of Wisconsin as the Director of the University of Wisconsin Comprehensive Cancer Center from July 1997 until October 2002. He came to the University of Wisconsin in 1997 from Stanford University where he had served as Chair of the Department of Surgery. In June 2002, President George W. Bush appointed Dr. Niederhuber Chair of the National Cancer Advisory Board, a position he held until resigning to become the Deputy Director at NCI.

Dr. Niederhuber is a nationally recognized cancer surgeon with a special clinical emphasis in gastrointestinal cancer, hepatobiliary cancer and breast cancer. He is recognized for his pioneering work in hepatic artery infusion chemotherapy and was the first to demonstrate the feasibility of totally implantable vascular access devices. Dr. Niederhuber has been a member of the Society of Surgical Oncology since 1978 and served as SSO President (2001-02). He also served as President of the American Association of Cancer Institutes (AACI) (2001-03). Dr. Niederhuber was one of the founding members and served on the executive committee of the American College of Surgeons Oncology Cooperative Group.

His laboratory research interests focus on protein tyrosine kinases and signal transduction in normal and abnormal cell growth. Trained as an immunologist, Dr. Niederhuber's laboratory worked for many years studying the role of the murine major histocompatibility complex immuoregulatory genes. In recent years, his laboratory has had a specific interest in the regulation of the expression of tyrosine kinases, especially blk, a B-cell specific kinase, both at the transcriptional and translational level. The Blk-proto-oncogene was a novel discovery in Dr. Niederhuber's laboratory while he was a member of the faculty at The Johns Hopkins Medical School and is of interest because of its unique expression in B-cells and its participation in both proliferative and apoptotic pathways during B-cell differentiation. His laboratory has demonstrated the presence of an Internal Ribosomal Entry Site (IRES) within the 5' UTR of blk mRNA. This discovery has raised the possibility that blk function may depend on whether translation occurs in a cap-dependent or cap-independent IRES mediated manner. The laboratory is also interested in a class of genes expressing proteins described as KH-binding domain proteins. This class of proteins has RNA-binding capacity and act to prolong mRNA stability for translation.

Dr Niederhuber has considerable experience as a leader in the cancer field. He served as a member of the NCI Cancer Center's Review Committee (1984-86) and the NCI Division of Cancer Treatment Board of Scientific Counselors (1986-1991). He was Chairman of the Board from 1987-1991. He was a member of the NCAB Subcommittee to Evaluate the National Cancer Program (Committee to Assess Measures of Progress Against Cancer), chairing the Molecular Medicine Panel (1993-95). He was a member of the American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer from 1983-95, chairing the commission from (1989-90). Dr. Niederhuber has served on the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation Kettering Prize Selection Committee (1988-89) and twice served on the GMCRF Awards Assembly (1988-92), (1998-02). Dr. Niederhuber served on ASCO's Public Issues Committee from 1985-86 and the Nominating Committee in 1993. Dr. Niederhuber chaired the ASCO Surgical Oncology Task Force for the 2001-02 strategic planning process. He chaired the ASCO Public Policy and Practice Committee (2002-2003). He is a member of the Burroughs-Wellcome Foundation Translational Research Advisory Committee (1999-06).

Dr. Niederhuber is a graduate of Bethany College, Bethany, West Virginia and the Ohio State University School of Medicine. He was an NIH Academic Trainee in Surgery at the University of Michigan (1969-70) and a Visiting Fellow, Division of Immunology, The Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden (1970-71). He completed his training in surgery at the University of Michigan in 1973. He was a member of the faculty of the University of Michigan from 1973 to 1987, being promoted to Professor of Microbiology/Immunology and Professor of Surgery in 1980. During 1986-87, he was Visiting Professor in the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Dr. Niederhuber joined the faculty at The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in 1987 as Professor of Surgery, Oncology, and Molecular Biology and Genetics. In 1991, He was appointed Emile Holman Professor of Surgery, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology and Chair of the Department of Surgery, Stanford University. He left Stanford in 1997 to become the Director of the University of Wisconsin Comprehensive Cancer Center where he guided the consolidation of the University's two distinguished NCI supported cancer centers.

Dr. Niederhuber was recipient of a U.S. Public Health Service Career Development Award from NIAID (1974-79). In 1978 he received the Distinguished Faculty Service Award from the University of Michigan. He has also been recognized with the Alumni Achievement Award from The Ohio State University College of Medicine in 1989 and the Distinguished Alumni Award in Medicine from Bethany College (1995). He was elected to Who's Who in America in 1998 and Who's Who in Medicine and Health Care (1997). In addition, he has received numerous honorary professorships and is currently serving on the editorial board of ten scientific journals. He was a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Clinical Oncology (1993-95). He has authored and coauthored more than 180 publications and edited four books, including, with distinguished colleagues, the highly regarded reference text Clinical Oncology which is currently in its third edition.

He has served as an advisor to a number of cancer centers, a number of cancer foundation boards and NCI committees. Dr. Niederhuber is a member of the Board of C-Change, formerly the National Dialogue on Cancer, led by President George H.W. Bush, Mrs. Barbara Bush and Senator Dianne Feinstein. Dr. Niederhuber has also served the as co-chair of the CEO Roundtable task force to develop a plan for future oncology drug development and was recently appointed by former President Bush as a member of the prestigious CEO Roundtable.

Richard J. Turman

Mr. Turman is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Budget, HHS. He joined federal service as a Presidential Management Intern in 1987 at the Office of Management and Budget, where he worked as a Budget Examiner and later as a Branch Chief. He has worked as a Legislative Assistant in the Senate, as the Director of Federal Relations for an association of research universities, and as the Associate Director for Budget of the National Institutes of Health. He received a Bachelor's Degree from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a Masters in Public Policy from the University of California, Berkeley

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