Mitchell J. Weiss, MD, PhD, chair of the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital Department of Hematology and Arthur Nienhuis Endowed Chair, has been elected to the National Academy of Medicine (NAM). Membership in the Academy is considered one of the highest honors in the fields of health and medicine. NAM addresses critical health, science and medicine issues and works alongside the National Academy of Sciences and National Academy of Engineering to provide independent advice to the nation.
In his nomination, Weiss was cited for his leading research in the biology of blood cell formation and how noncancerous blood diseases disrupt that process. His recent work has greatly emphasized translational studies aimed at developing new treatments for blood disorders, particularly sickle cell disease and beta-thalassemia, using novel genome editing and base editing tools.
He has published over 170 original research papers in journals including Cell, Nature, Nature Genetics, Nature Biomedical Engineering, Nature Medicine, Blood, Cancer Discovery, Haematologica, Science Translational Medicine and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
“Election to the National Academy of Medicine is a well-deserved recognition for Dr. Weiss and speaks to his groundbreaking research in the field of hematology. He is advancing our understanding of catastrophic blood disorders in children and young adults, which will ultimately lead to better treatments and quality of life for patients around the world,” said James R. Downing, MD, St. Jude president and CEO, who is also a member of NAM.
“I am deeply honored to be recognized by the Academy, and I am eager to support its work as we continue furthering the mission of St. Jude,” Weiss said. “When Dr. Downing hired me, he said, ‘We want you to be bold and be brave and think big,’ and I have kept that in mind as we continue to perform basic research, launch clinical trials and expand the Collaborative Research Consortium for Sickle Cell Disease.”
Weiss received his MD and PhD in genetics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and trained in pediatric hematology-oncology at Boston Children’s Hospital, the Dana Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard University. He joined the faculty at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania before moving to St. Jude in 2014. He has secured continuous funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) since 2002, is a former member of the NIH study section: Molecular and Cellular Hematology, and serves as an external advisor for numerous NIH training grants related to classical hematology.
Weiss joins six other St. Jude faculty members who have been named to NAM, including Nobel laureate Peter Doherty, PhD; current and former CEOs James R. Downing, MD; William E. Evans, PharmD; and Arthur Nienhuis, MD; as well as Mary Relling, PharmD; and Charles Sherr, MD, PhD. In addition, this marks the 13th appointment of a St. Jude faculty member to the collective National Academies: Martine Roussel, PhD; Brenda Schulman, PhD; Douglas Green, PhD; and Robert Webster, PhD, along with Doherty and Sherr have previously been elected to the National Academy of Sciences.
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital is leading the way the world understands, treats and cures childhood cancer, sickle cell disease, and other life-threatening disorders. It is the only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center devoted solely to children. Treatments developed at St. Jude have helped push the overall childhood cancer survival rate from 20% to 80% since the hospital opened more than 60 years ago. St. Jude shares the breakthroughs it makes to help doctors and researchers at local hospitals and cancer centers around the world improve the quality of treatment and care for even more children. To learn more, visit stjude.org, read St. Jude Progress, a digital magazine, and follow St. Jude on social media at @stjuderesearch.
