The Mike Price Gold Medal Award was created in 2012 in memory of Professor Mike Price, Secretary General of the EACR for 21 years, who died of cancer in 2000. The Award Winner gives a keynote lecture at the EACR Congress and receives a commemorative medal and €10,000 honorarium.
Professor Mariano Barbacid is the winner of the 2024 Mike Price Gold Medal Award. The award was presented at the EACR 2024 Congress in Rotterdam, Netherlands in June 2024, where Professor Barbacid presented the Keynote Award Lecture.
Mariano Barbacid is the AXA-CNIO Professor of Molecular Oncology at the Spanish National Cancer Research Center (CNIO) in Madrid, Spain. He got his Ph.D. in Madrid’s Universidad Complutense (1974) and trained as a postdoctoral fellow at the US National Cancer Institute (1974-78) where he started his own research group in 1978. His work led in 1982 to the isolation of the first human oncogene, HRAS, and the identification of the first mutation associated with the development of human cancer.
He is also credited with the isolation of the TRK oncogene. This discovery led the Barbacid group to identify in 1991 the TRK family of tyrosine protein kinase receptors as the functional receptors for the NGF family of neurotrophins. More recently, TRK oncogenes have become the paradigm of agnostic tumor therapies.
In 1988, he joined Bristol Myers-Squibb where he became Vice President, Oncology Drug Discovery. In 1998, he returned to Madrid to create and direct the Spanish National Cancer Research Center (CNIO). In 2011, Barbacid stepped down as CNIO Director to focus on his long-standing interests in identifying therapeutic strategies against KRAS mutant tumors
Barbacid was inducted to the US National Academy of Sciences in 2012 and in 2014 he was elected Fellow of the Academy of the American Association for Cancer Research. His work has been recognized by several domestic and international awards. In 2011, he received an Endowed Chair from the AXA Research Fund (Paris).
To date, he has authored 327 publications, including 245 original research articles in journals with impact factor. Currently, his Hirsch "h" factor is 125.
2022: Cédric Blanpain
2020: Pier Giuseppe Pelicci
2018: Karen Vousden
2016: Michael Stratton
2014: Harald zur Hausen
2012: José Baselga
Above: 2024 winner Mariano Barbacid
The Mike Price Gold Medal Award commemorates the life and work of perhaps the most significant figure in the EACR’s history. Mike Price served as Secretary General of the EACR for 21 years. He died in 2000 after fighting bravely for just over a year against an unusual form of cancer. Edith Olah, EACR President at the time, wrote that his death brought immense sadness to all the many members of the EACR who knew and loved him.
Mike Price was an excellent educator and countless students benefitted from his enthusiasm and understanding. Among many initiatives, he was instrumental in setting up the EACR Travel Fellowship programme which continues to give early career scientists the opportunity to visit and train in centres of excellence throughout Europe and beyond.