V. Craig Jordan, Internationally Renowned Breast Cancer Scientist, Joins Georgetown's...

V. Craig Jordan, Internationally Renowned Breast Cancer Scientist, Joins
Georgetown's Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center

WASHINGTON, April 20 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Georgetown University Medical
Center and the Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center announce the recruitment
of one of the world's most respected cancer researchers, V. Craig Jordan, OBE,
PhD, DSc,. Jordan joins Lombardi in July as scientific director for the
cancer center and vice chairman of the department of oncology.

Jordan's scientific leadership is recognized the world over. He brings an
unparalleled focus to the excellent breast cancer program at Lombardi and
joins nearly 30 faculty members working exclusively on finding a cure for the
disease. Georgetown University is ranked 6th in the world for publications on
breast cancer research underscoring its excellence and dedication to
eradicating the disease.

"We are thrilled to have Dr. Jordan join Lombardi," says Louis M. Weiner, MD,
director of the cancer center. "His towering contributions to the field of
breast cancer therapy are widely recognized and appreciated. I can think of no
breast cancer researcher who has made more important observations, with more
profound implications for improving the treatment of breast cancer.

"Dr. Jordan will occupy a vital role at Lombardi. While one of these
prioritized areas certainly will be breast cancer, his charge extends to our
entire scientific portfolio. As scientific director, he will work with me to
prioritize areas for scientific investment, and will be charged with
identifying, creating and nurturing high-impact, multidisciplinary,
cancer-focused collaborations within Lombardi, across the Georgetown
University Medical Center and with other institutions."

A pharmacologist whose research focuses on the response of breast cancer cells
to preventive and treatment agents, Jordan is recognized by many as the
"father" the anti-cancer drug tamoxifen, a drug that blocks estrogen from
fueling some breast cancers. Tamoxifen was the first in a class of drugs
known as selective estrogen receptor modulators or SERMs.

"Craig Jordan is an extraordinary scientist whose research and insights have
in effect created the endocrine breast cancer therapy known as SERMs," says
Howard J. Federoff, MD, PhD, executive vice president for health sciences and
executive dean of the School of Medicine at Georgetown University Medical
Center. "His research has been innovative and through its translation has
resulted in enormous clinical benefit for women with some forms of breast
cancer."

Tamoxifen revolutionized breast cancer treatment when it became the first drug
proven to prevent cancer recurrence in women treated with adjuvant therapy for
the disease. Then, years later, tamoxifen became the first drug approved to
reduce the risk of breast cancer in women at high risk of developing the
disease. Millions of women around the world continue to be treated with
tamoxifen. According to Jordan, tamoxifen has saved the lives of more than a
half million women with breast cancer.

Tamoxifen was first studied as a contraceptive in the 1960s but shelved when
the drug failed to prevent pregnancies. Jordan was the first scientist to
focus attention on tamoxifen's anticancer properties and its ability to
prevent breast cancer in laboratory animals. His pioneering work guided the
evolution from preclinical lab studies to clinical research on the drug.
Tamoxifen was the "gold standard" for endocrine therapy of breast cancer for
25 years. A related drug and SERM, raloxifene, also came from Jordan's
laboratory. Raloxifene is used both for the prevention of breast cancer and
osteoporosis.

Jordan's distinguished list of national and international awards includes the
2008 ASCO David A. Karnofsky Memorial Award for advances that have changed the
way doctors treat breast cancer patients. Also in 2008, Jordan became one of
five scholars from around the world to receive an Honorary Fellowship of the
Royal Society of Medicine at the Royal Society of Medicine (RSM) in London.
The award is one of the highest honors in British medicine.

Jordan also received the 2007 University of Massachusetts Medical
School/Worcester Foundation Gregory Pincus Memorial Award and Medal. In 2006,
he was honored with ASCO's American Cancer Society Award for Chemoprevention.
Other awards include the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation's 2003
Charles F. Kettering Prize for the most outstanding contribution to cancer
treatment, the American Cancer Society's 2002 Medal of Honor for basic
research, the 2001 Bristol-Myers Squibb Award for Distinguished Achievement in
Cancer Research and the first Brinker International Breast Cancer Award for
Basic Science from the Susan G. Komen Foundation in 1992. In 2002, Queen
Elizabeth II named him an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British
Empire (OBE) for services to international breast cancer research.

In addition, Jordan has been honored by the American Association for Cancer
Research, in 1989 and 2002, the British Pharmacological Society, the American
Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, the Royal Society of
Chemistry and many other professional groups and institutions around the
world. He also received the Pennsylvania Breast Cancer Coalition's 2001 Pink
Ribbon Award for outstanding individuals dedicated to finding a cure for
breast cancer.

Jordan comes to Lombardi from Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia where he
serves as vice president and scientific director for the medical sciences and
holds the Alfred G. Knudson Jr., MD, PhD, Chair in Cancer Research. Jordan is
also an adjunct professor of cancer biology at the University of Pennsylvania
and a visiting professor of molecular medicine at the University of Leeds in
England.

Before joining Fox Chase, Jordan was the Diana, Princess of Wales Professor of
Cancer Research, professor of cancer pharmacology and director of the Lynn
Sage Breast Cancer Research Program at the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive
Cancer Center at Northwestern University. He was also professor of molecular
pharmacology and biological chemistry and professor of medicine at
Northwestern's Feinberg School of Medicine.

Born in Texas to an English mother and American father, he grew up in rural
England and earned his undergraduate and doctoral degrees in pharmacology at
the University of Leeds, completing his PhD in 1972. Although appointed to the
faculty at Leeds, Jordan first came to the United States for postdoctoral
training. He was a research associate and then a visiting scientist at the
Worcester Foundation for Experimental Biology in Shrewsbury, Mass., from 1972
to 1974.

After teaching at Leeds until 1979, he held a one-year appointment to
establish the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research at the University of Berne
in Switzerland and then joined the University of Wisconsin faculty in 1980.
For his seminal contributions to the pharmacology of non-steroidal
anti-estrogens, Leeds awarded him a doctor of science degree in 1985 and he
became a full professor of human oncology and pharmacology at Wisconsin the
same year. His roles at Wisconsin included directing the University of
Wisconsin Comprehensive Cancer Center Breast Cancer Program until he joined
the Northwestern faculty in 1993.

About Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center The Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer
Center, part of Georgetown University Medical Center and Georgetown University
Hospital, seeks to improve the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of cancer
through innovative basic and clinical research, patient care, community
education and outreach, and the training of cancer specialists of the future.
Lombardi is one of only 41 comprehensive cancer centers in the nation, as
designated by the National Cancer Institute, and the only one in the
Washington, DC, area. For more information, go to
http://lombardi.georgetown.edu.

About Georgetown University Medical Center
Georgetown University Medical Center is an internationally recognized academic
medical center with a three-part mission of research, teaching and patient
care (through Georgetown's affiliation with MedStar Health). GUMC's mission is
carried out with a strong emphasis on public service and a dedication to the
Catholic, Jesuit principle of cura personalis -- or "care of the whole
person." The Medical Center includes the School of Medicine and the School of
Nursing and Health Studies, both nationally ranked, the world-renowned
Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center and the Biomedical Graduate Research
Organization (BGRO), home to 60 percent of the university's sponsored research
funding.

SOURCE Georgetown University Medical Center

Karen Mallet of Georgetown University Medical Center, +1-414-312-7085,
km463@georgetown.edu