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Hancock named chair of Integrative Biology and Pharmacology

Dean Giuseppe Colasurdo has announced Dr. John Hancock will be the new chair of the Department of Integrative Biology and Pharmacology, effective Jan. 1

Hancock, who is a British and Australian citizen, is coming to the Medical School from the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, where he is the deputy director of research for the Institute for Molecular Bioscience. He has held that position since January 2006 and also has an adjunct appointment in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Pathology at the University of Queensland School of Medicine. He previously served as chair of the school’s Division of Molecular Cell Biology for three years, and was professor of experimental oncology there for eight years.

He runs a prolific research lab with interest on the roles of Ras proteins in cellular signaling– an area of investigation that he has studied since his graduate years. “I am very pleased to bring Dr. Hancock on board and am asking him to renew this department, giving him the resources to expand the faculty, purchase needed equipment to further his research here, and expand the educational offerings of the department both at the medical student level and the graduate and postdoctoral level of our program,” Dean Colasurdo said. “Dr. Hancock brings great experience to our school and a highly relevant area of research. I am confident that he will be a strong leader and an outstanding mentor.” Hancock received his M.B. (bachelor of medicine) B.Chir. (bachelor of surgery) from the University of Cambridge St. Thomas’ Hospital Medical School and his Ph.D. from the University of London . Following his medical and surgical internships as a house physician and a house surgeon, he entered the U.S. equivalent of a two-year medical residency rotation through major London teaching hospitals, obtaining general medical training in cardiology, neurology, hematology, oncology, and intensive care. He then specialized in hematology at the Royal Free Hospital in London. Prior to his appointment at the University of Queensland in 1995, Hancock was a senior scientist and director of Ras research at Onyx Pharmaceuticals in California. Dr. Norman Weisbrodt has been the interim chair of the Department of Integrative Biology and Pharmacology since Dr. Ferid Murad stepped down as chair Aug. 31, 2005.