Weissman, Irving L.

IRVING L. WEISSMAN is professor of pathology and developmental biology and is currently the director of the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine and director of the Stanford Comprehensive Cancer Center at Stanford University, California, and has researched heavily the evolution of stem cells and progenitor cells, mainly those involved in blood forming and brain forming. This has also allowed him to work on programs to isolate and characterize rare cancer and leukemia stem cells, which have provided more scope to doctors dealing with oncology and the need to develop methods of attacking dangerous cells once they have been identified and isolated.

Weissman heads a laboratory at Stanford that has been focusing on developmental biology, self—renewal, and the homing and functions of the cells that come together for the forming of the blood and immune systems. The laboratory became the first to isolate, in pure form, any stem cells from any tissue in any species. Working with mice, they managed to isolate the hematopoietic stem cells. This was followed by research doing the same for humans. Initially, this allowed the use of these stem cells to provide cancer—free autologous stem cell transplants, which were beneficial for patients suffering from cancer who otherwise might have had to be subjected to very high, and possibly lethal, doses of chemotherapy or radiotherapy.

Research by Weissman continued, identifying the stages of development that occur between stem cells and the mature blood cells. These led to detailed studies of the common lymphocyte progenitor, the [Page 618]common myeloid progenitor, and the descendents of the common myeloid progenitor, as well as the common granulocyte and monocyte progenitor and megakaryocyte/erythrocyte progenitors.

In addition to the work at Stanford University, the Weissman laboratory also has a group at Hopkins Marine Station at Pacific Grove, California, where they conduct research into protochordates—animals that preceded the chordates possibly representing the link between some forms of invertebrates and vertebrates. This has provided a great deal of new information on parasitic organs and led to enhancing the study of cell biology.

Irving L. Weissman was born on October 21, 1929, at Great Falls, Montana, and graduated with a bachelor of science degree from Montana State College in 1961, completing his medical degree at Stanford University in 1965. Weissman then became a National Institutes of Health fellow at the Department of Radiology at Stanford University from 1965 until 1967, before being a research associate from 1967 until 1968. Appointed assistant professor in 1969, he rose to the position of associate professor of the Department of Pathology in 1981. In that year, he was appointed professor of pathology at the School of Medicine at Stanford, and in 1989, he was appointed professor of developmental biology at the Department of Pathology.

In addition to those major appointments, Weissman was Senior Dernham fellow at the California division of the American Cancer Society from 1969 until 1973. He was also a member of the immunobiology study section at the National Institutes of Health from 1976 until 1980, a member of the science review board at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute beginning in 1986, a member of the science advisory commission of the Irvington House Institute from 1987, and cofounder of SyStemix, Inc., in 1988, acting on the boards of directors of SyStemix, Inc., and StemCells in 1996 and Celtrans (now Cellerant)—the successor to SyStemix, Inc.—beginning in 2001. During the same time, he was a director and also the chair of their scientific advisory boards. In 1987, he was also Karel and Avice Beckhuis Professor of Cancer Biology and the 5th Annual Visiting Professor of Cancer Biology at the University of Texas Health Science Center. In 1990, Weissman was distinguished lecturer at the Western Society for Clinical Investment and was chairman of the U.S.—Japan Immunology Board from 1992 until 1994. He has also been closely connected with the Science Advisory Commission of McLaughlin Research Institute as chairman and also as trustee, beginning in 1992, and a member of the board of governors of Project Information beginning in 1995.

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